Just in time for Christmas and the New Year I have three pieces of very good news for Wey Valley Swimming Club!

Firstly, Chris Beckett has accepted our offer to become Head Coach on a permanent basis. Chris was Head Coach at WVSC for twelve years until a couple of years ago and has been working with the Senior squad for the last few weeks and was at the National League gala in Bognor with the team. I know that Chris feels really motivated for the job in hand and is excited to be back at the club with which he feels a real affinity. In short he understands the Wey Valley ethos and buys into our vision - that was a key component in finding the right Head Coach.

Secondly, we have appointed Joanne (Jo) Weston to the position of Lead Coach of the Comp Dev squad to replace Jeni Colbourne with effect from the start of the new term in January. Jo is a former county swimmer for Mid Glamorgan, a Level Two Coach and she formerly swam and coached at Caerphilly County SC. She is a 29 year old school teacher in Woking, teaching Year 5s and also does 'one on one' swim teaching at the Spectrum. She has eagerly bought into the WV ethos and has visited one Senior and one Comp Dev session already.

One of Chris Becketts's primary jobs apart from directly working with the Senior Squad will be to work with Krystle Fryer as the Leader of the Saturday Teaching team (in Jess Meddings absence on maternity) and Jo to make the movement of swimmers between squads, more seamless.

The third piece of really good news is that we have received confirmation from the ASA of the revalidation of our Swim21 status for another year - only 50% of the clubs in England have qualified for Swim21 status!

We have a really strong coaching and teaching team which now has a new leader and a new senior coach, a really committed committee, a top rate group of volunteers, loads of qualified officials and most importantly 230+ swimmers who want to carry on swimming, competing and enjoying themselves!

Merry Christmas and here's to a very Happy Wey Valley New Year!

Best Regards
Mark Hammersley