President's Prattle - November 2021

We are certainly in the middle of a busy time for the Club. One piece of excellent news is our nomination of Pauline Wingate for City of Mandurah Senior Sports Star of the year making the list of finalists. It will be a great night of celebration on Nov 24th and we wish Pauline all our best for this award.

Saturday 13th was a fun day at the Warnbro Aqua Jetty, when the Rockingham Masters hosted this year’s Banks/Phillips Trophy. 15 Manna's swimmers made 4 relay teams for straight swims and novelty events, with all teams predicting times for each event. Nearest –the-time was the aim. In the end Rockingham were a mere 8 points ahead and retained the trophy. With its emphasis on fun, I am sure Ken Phillips would have been looking down and smiling. The Rocky Rays are a rapidly growing club and now boast 85 members, so it is great to see their development.

The WOW series of open water swims began this weekend with a smaller than usual contingent heading to Lake Leschenaultia for the lake swim. Keep your eyes out for the WOW series each of which is run by a masters club.

Once again I thank Glenda, Helen and the team for the great fundraiser last month that enabled our club to provide $2500 to the Nippers and Starfish Nippers programs at the local Mandurah Surf Life Saving Club. It is terrific to provide support for our local junior swimmers. Thanks to Glenda and Deb for taking the time to visit the surf club and present the cheque.

The next 2 weekends are highlights events for our Club. Saturday 20th is the highly prized “Doddi's Dash”. If you have not yet entered, contact Sue MacDonald and join the excitement of this 1km handicap event. The fashion parade with “Ozzy icon” theme is the prelude and always provides some highlights.

Nov 28th is the years “must attend” Live Lighter Club Challenge pool meet in our outside pool at MARC. As the host and organising club we would love to dominate through weight of entry numbers. If you haven’t yet entered, then please do so before this Friday. We will need helpers at the pool about 4.30 pm on Saturday 27th to set up the meet, and warm-up on Sunday starts at 8.00 am.

Good to see our training numbers on Tuesdays and Thursdays beginning to grow as things warm up. Many swimmers are setting up for a great summer of swimming.

So, keep swimming, look after each other, and always be kind!!

Steve C