News

Penguin congratulations to newly-weds Marta & F-X and Kim & Bryan, and to Nadine & Julian on the arrival of their baby girl, Pushka.

It was a good day today - the sun was shining at last and Penguin Masters swimmers had some great results in two open water races.

Montse Verdugo and Lisa Williams did the 3k Windsor Swim finishing 4th and 5th in their respective categories. They were among the few brave (or should that be mad?) souls who didn't wear wetsuits, using the race as training for their Channel-relay in August.

Across town Fran Lou, Richard Royal, Agnes Zsofia Nagy and Charles Wahab competed in the inaugural Tri-Roots race at West Reservoir near Manor House. All four swam the 750m distance and finished 3rd, 5th, 6th and 7th overall.

Penguins Nick Beard, Bruce Elder and Tom Perry pictured with the team mates from the GB at the VIII Water Polo Masters Cup of Spain in Lanzarote earlier this month.

This was an over-40s tournament with teams from Russia, Germany, Holland, Spain, Italy and Brazil to name a few. Our boys had several good games to reach the semi-finals but lost 10-8 to the eventual winners, Dynamo Moscow. A good time was had by all with everyone looking forward to the next tournament in 2 years time. 

From L to R: Ramon Valvona (Portobello), Keith Anderson (Portobello), Giles Gilhooley (Portobello), Paul Annagarn (Poly), Fraser Rutherford (Portobello), John Clark (Poly), Alan Anderson (Portobello), Nick Beard (Penguin), Bruce Elder (Penguin), Tom Perry (Penguin) and Jerry Birmingham (Cheltenham).

Congratulations to Penguin Junior, Dominic McLoughlin, who is the inaugural winner of the Middlesex County Ron Turner Memorial Trophy. Dominic is pictured here receiving the trophy from Middlesex County President, Andy Woska.
 
Dominic wins this new award for being an ever-present player with the Middlesex county side throughout its most successful junior season in over 25 years. The team won the London League, Southern Counties and an international tournament in Belgium.
 
Dominic led by example - training hard and regularly, and being a key member of the team.

Tickets are now on sale for our Summer Party on Saturday 29 June at the restored 1930s open-air pool in Uxbridge. 

• Team and novelty swimming races
• Mixed adult and mixed junior water polo games
• Food and drink

A great evening for the whole Club, family and friends. More details here.

Check out the photos from our Dinner Dance at the end of last month...

The Penguin Under 19 water polo team competed in the preliminary round of the ASA National Age Group Championships in Gloucester this weekend. The squad has been built around the Middlesex County backed training sessions at Hillingdon Leisure Centre and the wider support of other Middlesex clubs, principally Enfield Water Polo club, also with a representative from Ealing.

We were drawn in a very strong group with last year's winners (Lancaster) and semi-finalists (Birmingham), together with Cheltenham, Barnstaple and Welsh Wanderers.

Our first game was against Birmingham, who raced away into a 3 - 1 lead before we really got going, and finished the first half at 5 -2. A strong half time team talk got the team going again and we won the second half 2 - 0, narrowly missing an opportunity to draw the game level near the end - losing just 5 - 4 overall.

 We next played Lancaster and we went goal for goal with them in the first half, finishing at 3 -2 down. The second half was tougher and we lost 2 - 1 - leaving the game overall 5 - 3. However, this was a very creditable performance against last year's winners.

Our final game on the Saturday night was against Cheltenham and the efforts expended in the first two very tough games showed and a tiring squad lost 8 - 4.

After a good night's rest and some re-fuelling, the team faced up to two must win games if we were to progress in the competition. The commitment and team effort in Sunday's games was fantastic, with the tempo picked up significantly.

Our first game was against Barnstaple and, although we took time to get going in the first half at just 2 - 1, we put that right with a comprehensive 8 - 1 win in the second half with goals contributed from all across the team, giving a 10 - 2 win overall.

This left effectively a winner takes all game against Welsh Wanderers, with the successful team picking up the qualification space. This time (with the rugby disaster in Cardiff on Saturday still fresh in everyone's minds), we raced away to a 5 - 1 lead, with four great team goals each finished by Joe Ortiz. With that position in hand, the full squad was able to enjoy the second half and we won the game 7 - 3, securing our qualification into the next round.

The team improved steadily over the weekend and it would have been really interesting to see the results if we had played the weaker teams first and been able to build up to the tough early games that we had lost very narrowly. Hopefully we will have an opportunity to test that again as the Championships progress.

Pictured here: back row, left to right: Max Dewhurst, Ben Garland, Albie Duffy, Rhys Goodall, Steve Baker (Coach), Joe Ortiz, Dom McLoughlin, Demetris Soukeras, Venu Manikavasagar and Matteo Castelnuovo. Front row, left to right: Charlie Briers, Ollie Bolderson, Chris Waller and Richard Waller.

A team from City of London School, comprising all but one Penguin players, has won the Under 18 Schools National Championships.

The victorious team is picture here: Arthur Lewis, Ollie Bolderson, Dom McLouglin, Jack Farkas, Rene Zamudio, Jack Pentol-Levy, Albie Duffy, Venu Manikavasagar, Jack Emlyn-Jones, Rhys Goodall and Max Dewhurst.