The first set of Southern Counties Long Course Championships at the Crystal Palace 50-metre competition pool presents a fresh set of challenges for swimmers following the short course county championship events.

Colchester swimmers rose well to the occasion with Jonathan Howkins producing a very determined swim in the heats to take pole position for both the men's open and over-17 100m finals.

In the open final, Jonathan took command from the gun and although hard pressed snatched an excellent 68-second victory.

With insufficient recovery for the next final, he took on a fresh line-up of qualifiers to achieve a well-deserved second place.

In the 50-metre mens breaststroke, Jonathan again qualified for the final as fastest swimmer and won the event in a fast time of 30.35sec.

In the younger 11 year age group, Matthew Vinter, keen for long course

experience after his gold medal performance in the Essex Championships, displayed great future potential when he took the bronze medal in a closely-contested 100 metres freestyle event in a new best time of 68.26sec.

He later went on to touch inside his previous best for a place in the 100m butterfly final where a sparkling 80.1sec brought Matthew in for his second bronze medal.

His last event was his less favoured 100m backstoke where he pulled out an exceptional performance to achieve a further bronze medal in a best time of 79.27 seconds.

Lizzie Bellinger never fails to display excellent technique in her butterfly events.

This weekend was no exception when she recorded a personal best for silver in the ladies open butterfly.

Both Susanna Davies and brother Ian produced some excellent personal bests in their breastroke and freestyle events with Susanna using the event for long course practice following her selection along with Howkins for the Essex County teams competing in the inter-county championships later this month.

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