Longford Swimming Club members swim through the night for 24 hour swimathon fundraiser

Longford Swimming Club is hosting a 24 hour Swimathon this coming weekend starting Saturday, February 24 at 2pm running through the night until Sunday, February 25 finishing at 2pm at Coral Leisure Longford. All funds raised in aid of Longford Swimming Club. 

Longford Swimming Club has been providing young swimmers in the area with a high standard of swimming coaching for many years. 

It was re-formed in 1992 and since then has even further developed its vision and objectives. Longford Swimming Club Secretary Shona Matthews explained, “The club vision is two-fold: To instill a life-long love of swimming and to build a programme of excellence in training, team unity and character development where every swimmer will gain increased personal confidence. 

“To deliver a Long-term Athlete Development programme, where the training and competitive involvement for each individual is appropriate to their stage of development, in order to achieve their full swimming potential. Where a competitive path is followed, foster the athletes progression through the stages of competition to compete up to the highest level of provincial, national and international standards.”

Longford Swimming Club currently has over 160 members from the local area.

Ms Matthews outlined, 

“Members start off in the Seal group:

• This is our first group on entering the club, training sessions are about practicing how to do strokes well and learning how to breath correctly. Swim sessions are held twice a week. This group helps to build the foundation for a successful club. 

“On progression swimmers will move to Minnows:

• This group works to develop stroke even further and build on stamina as training takes place 4 times a week. This requires more commitment from swimmers, also giving swimmers a take of competition in attending fun galas. 

“Our next group is Dolphins:

• This group is for swimmers who are competent swimmers and who want to be involved at a competitive level. Sessions work on anaerobic training and race preparation. 

“Our top group is Sharks. 

• This is the high-performance group. Training takes place 6 days a week. Sessions concentrate on maximising swimmers skills and techniques as well as increasing fitness. Shark group attend galas right up to national standard. 

Longford Swimming Club welcomes new swimmers to join. Swimmers should be able to swim a length of the pool comfortably to join. New swimmers can register for the trial sessions to join the club which are held at the end of August and early January. All information for trials and sign up can be found on their website longfordswimmingpool.com or can email secretarylongfordswimmingclub@gmail.ie for more information. 

Ms Matthews said the swimathon is open for anyone to join and  registration is available via the Longford Swimming Club Facebook page. 

She explained, “The Sharks group will start the Swimathon in UCD swimming pool at 2pm. Then at 4pm the Seals group will swim from 4 to 5pm. At 5pm this is open to swim club members and any member of the public that would like to swim. Swim slots are 30 minutes. 

“Participants will swim through the night with swimmers sleeping over in The Mall to swim through the night. The next morning at 8am we have our Dolphin group swimming for two hours, with our Seals and Minnow groups taking the next two hours slots. From 12 noon to 2pm we have swimmers signed up to complete our challenge. It's sure to be slashing fun! Parents are helping to count lengths and supervise. All hands on deck!”

The club has a GoFundMe page set up called Longford Swimming Club 24 hour swim