BRISTOL NORTH SWIMMING CLUB

The club was founded on 30th August 1922 at a public meeting held at the County Ground Hotel, Nevil Road, Bristol.

The first President of the Club was Col the Rt Hon Geo A Gibbs PC, MP who later became Lord Wraxall PC.

The objects of the Club were defined as:

The inauguration of the club coincided with the opening of Bristol North Swimming Pool, in those days the City Council did not think anyone would want to swim in the winter months, so a temporary wood floor was placed over the pool and the building was used as a cinema.

The club met on one night a week for training at Bristol North Pool, this was on a Thursday and until recently Thursday has always been considered to be "Club Night". Despite the limited training time available the records show that by 1923 there were 250 members and by 1927 the numbers had risen to 290. The records do not show how the club managed if all the members turned up on a Thursday evening as the pool was only 25 yards with 5 lanes!

In those early days the only competition appears to have been Water Polo matches and Annual Club Championships for the swimmers. The Championships consisted of only one stroke, freestyle, divided into under 16 and 16 and over. Apart from the mens freestyle which was 100 yards, all events were 50 yards. The Championships also included mens and ladies diving. The evening was extended with two games of Water Polo against another local club.

Eventually the City Council decided that the water depth was not sufficient for safe diving and the diving board was removed. Diving ceased to be included in the Club activities. Water Polo, which was very popular in the early days, became less so until during the 1980's it too ceased to be a Club activity.

Over the years the number of evenings of training has increased considerably and the Club has regularly made use of other swimming pools in the area. Early in the 1970's a new 25 metre pool was opened at Filton on the outskirts of the City. In November 2005, the link with bristol North pool was broken, when the pool was closed, and the club now swims that session at the new pool at Horfield Leisure Centre, and most other evenings at the Filton pool.

The Club has produced a lot of swimmers achieving National Age Group Championship qualifying times and most of these swimmers have swum in the Championships. At least 4 are known to have become National Age Group Champions these are Karen Pearce, Freestyle in the early 1970's; Amanda Fieldhouse, Freestyle in the late 1970's; Linsey Rogers, Breaststroke in the mid 1990's and Karen Lee, Backstroke in the late 1990's and on to qualify for the 2004 Olympics