TAVISTOCK's two swimming pools, Kelly College and Meadowlands, are participating in the BT Swimathon 2001. Wendy Dalton is the organiser at Kelly and her son James McGarry is organising the Swimathon at Meadowlands! Between them they hope Tavistock pools will raise over £4,000.

More than 70 swimmers at Kelly College pool took the plunge last week to swim against cancer as part of the BT Swimathon campaign to help raise money for some worthwhile charities.

The participants, whose ages ranged from seven to 87, made their charity splash during the course of four special BT Swimathon sessions at the pool in Tavistock.

Several individuals plus teams who swam in relay completed gruelling distances of 5,000m — just over three miles — 2,500 or 1,500.

The youngest swimmer to do the individual event was George Coiley, who swam the whole 5,000 metres, most of it breaststroke, in 2hr 52mins 50secs. George is only eight, and normally swims at Kelly on Friday evenings.

Rebecca Razey and Jack Coiley, both seven, swam 1,500m each and 10-year-old Caroline Ball completed the 5,000m in 1hr 28mins and raised £350.

The oldest was Eddie Dalton, aged 87, who swam 1,000m as part of the team called Dalton Diehards.

His grandson Terry Dalton, 31, swam the individual distance of 5,000 and was the pool's best fundraiser at over £400. The Dalton family overall raised £1,200.

The fastest swimmer was Kelly College squad member, Christoph Kreutzenbeck, who swam the 5,000m in only 1hr 5mins 23secs.

Wendy Dalton, the pool manager, said 'I must congratulate every BT Swimathon swimmer at Kelly pool for showing so much enthusiasm and effort in taking part. Now the swimmers have the task of collecting all that sponsorship money which has been pledged to help so many cancer charities.

Kelly College pool swimmers were among tens of thousands who participated in BT Swimathon 2001 in more than 500 pools across the UK in an effort to raise £2-million for charity. Fifty per cent of funds raised will go towards Macmillan Cancer Relief, 10 per cent to Breakthrough Breast Cancer and 10 per cent to Prostate Cancer Care, the remaining funds helping disability swimming, coaching courses to train school teachers to teach swimming and to charities local to Tavistock.