The Club offers a range of events and venues so that everyone can compete at a gala for their ability

There are lots of reasons for entering a gala:

  • To see how much progress you have made
  • To put your training into practise
  • To stretch yourselves to the limit
  • To improve your Personal Best times
  • To achieve qualifying times for other galas
  • To compete
  • To learn from watching better swimmers.
  • To represent Ilkley Swimming Club.
  • To meet new people.
  • To have fun.
  • To win.

Entering Galas

For all galas you will be required to complete an electronic entry form via a link in the newsletter. Your coach can give you advice as to which
events to enter. All galas have closing dates that are strictly enforced and your gala entry and payment must be completed by the deadline.

Types of Gala

Club Championships

This is a friendly introduction to competitive swimming. The Club Championships take place annually in March and are held at Ilkley pool.

Rising Stars Galas

These galas are designed for 8-14 year olds who train at Ilkley Swimming Club and the Rising Stars City of Bradford squad. They are ideal for younger less experienced swimmers.The galas take place on a Sunday afternoon at Shipley Pool. You can swim as many or as few races as you wish.Medals are awarded for each age group.

Grassroots Galas

These galas are open to local clubs only.You need to be at least 9 years old to enter but there is no upper age limit.This is a day long gala and therefore has more events to choose from.You can swim as many or as few races as you wish.Your time will be recorded electronically and your times will be stored in the ASA Database.The meet organisers set upper time limits for each age group and race so anyone with an electronic time faster than this cannot compete in that race.

Open Meets

In order to compete in an open meet you must have ASA Cat 2 registration, which can be arranged by the membership secretary. Open meets are more competitive as swimmers from any club can enter.They are usually graded (see below) so that you will be competing with swimmers of a similar standard.

AAA grade is approximately the same level as National Championships
AA grade is about Regional Level
A grade is about County Level
B grade is a good club swimmer
C grade is for all swimmers below B grade

Some galas are organised so that A, B and C grades all swim.These are the galas that we attend as it means that the whole club can compete together.The organisers set a lower and upper entry qualifying time for each grade, event and age group.Swimmers who have swum faster than the upper entry time for a race will not be allowed to compete in that race.Do not worry about this as your entry time will determine which grade you are entered for and the Gala Co-ordinator will contact you if there is a problem.

Yorkshire Championships

The Yorkshire Championship is a high level competition aimed at the best swimmers across the county.There are qualification times, which swimmers must have achieved in the year prior to the event.The Championships run in February and October.

NER Championships

This is a very high level competition aimed at the best swimmers in the North East region.There are qualification times, which swimmers must achieve in the year prior to entering the event.There is a short course championship, which takes place in November and a long course in May/June time.

Types of Pool

There are two types of pool competitions: long course and short course. Long course (LC) events are held in a 50m pool e.g. Ponds Forge in
Sheffield and John Charles in Leeds and short course events (SC) in a 25m pool. The major difference is that a swimmer will turn more often in
a SC competition and can therefore create more momentum from powering off the wall of the pool. Your times can be converted between the
two types of pool by going to www.pullbuoy.co.uk/times.

Races:

There are a range of races in a swimming programme. Typically they will be 50m, 100m, and 200m in each stroke (butterfly, backstroke, breaststroke and freestyle). With freestyle there is also a 400m, 800m (women) and 1500m (men) option.

Pentathlon Awards:

In order to reward and encourage our swimmers to compete at all strokes the Club operates a Pentathlon Award scheme. Those swimmers that swim all 5 of the following events will get an award at the Club Presentation Evening:

  • 50m or 100m fly
  • 50m or 100m back
  • 50m or 100m breast
  • 50m or 100m freestyle
  • 100m or 200m individual medley

Seniors/Masters Competitions:

Masters swimmers who wish to compete must have ASA Cat 2 Membership. Masters at Ilkley Swimming Club often compete at the following Meets:

  • Yorkshire Masters Championships
  • North East Region Masters Championships
  • Open National Long Course
  • European Masters Championships
  • British Masters Short Course

In addition masters and triathletes will have the opportunity to swim the British Swimming T30 and the BLDSA T60 competitions.

Other Competitions

Great North Swim – https://www.greatrun.org/great-swim/
Open Water Swimming – https://www.swimming.org/calendar/events-and-competitions/?discipline=open-water-swimming-competitions-and-training-courses and https://findarace.com/#swimming
Triathlon – https://www.britishtriathlon.org/events/search