Youngsters receive Cheshire Invitation

Crewe Chronicle – 21 Jan 2004

A TRIO of Crewe swimmers have been selected to represent Cheshire at the Inter-County Junior Invitation gala on February 1 at Wolverhampton Baths.

Joseph Wood, Abbie Henderson and James Cowburn are the chosen three.

Abbie celebrated her call-up with a string of successes at the City of Derby Open Meet, the highlight seeing her record a national qualifying time of 4minutes 56.81seconds in the 440m free-style.

She also achieved gold medals in the 11 years' 200m Individual Medley and 100m breaststroke, silvers in the 100m freestyle and 200m freestyle and secured first position in her age-group section of the Bagcat awards.

Meanwhile, the talented Stuart Bloor is now back in full training and looking forward to a busy year following a seven-month lay-off due to a foot infection.

Stuart, who suffers from spina bifida, is a regular swimmer with Crewe Flyers and is due to travel to Holland to compete in four events at the Double Dutch Open next week.

In March, he will compete at the Junior Disability Sport England National Championships in Sheffield and in May he will return to Sheffield to swim in the Senior Long Course Champion-ships which are also the Paralympics trials.

Stuart is currently ranked 13th in the world in the 100m back-stroke and number one in England at this event.

He hopes that with the encouragement, dedication and the training given by coaches Steven Milhench (Crewe Flyers) and Sarah Bailey ( North West), he will improve on his position and achieve his lifetime goal of going to the Paralympics.