Serpentine – 2016

Report by Brian Armstrong

Well that was a weekend!! Four Gloucester Masters open water swimmers braved the inaugural British Open Water Swimming Championships at the Swim Serpentine event on September 25th–and three came away with some hardware!! The event followed on from the mass participation swim on the Saturday where over 4000 swimmers converged on the centre of London for the first event in the Serpentine since the 2012 Olympic Marathon –thus the facilities and organisation were superb, even if the water, at 17.1C, was a little chilly and it has to be said “green”. Tony Cherrington was in a class of his own –literally –as he won the 70-74 age group in a time of 00:56:56, beating many younger competitors along the way. Lisa Jones took the silver in the 45-49 women’s age group despite the cold water and a shoulder niggle. Brian Armstrong took the bronze medal in the most populous 50-54 age group and John Coe narrowly missed out on a medal in the men’s 60-64 age group. Hopefully the event will be held again next year and a few more swimmers will participate.