Ulster swimmers Jonny Cummings, Stephen Campbell, Matthew Bell and James Hamilton have all set personal best times at the Paralympic World Swimming Championships in Eindhoven. 

Jonathan Cummings set a new personal best at IPC Paralympic World Swimming Championships to finish 5th in the final of the 100m Breaststroke.

  Jonathan blazed a trail in the 100m Breaststroke (SB5 Class). Ranked 6th fastest going into the evenings final Cummings, who is back after time off with a knee injury, called on all his reserves to finish in a time of 1.54.77, over 6.3 seconds off his previous mark.  

 A delighted Cummings said afterwards, “It was great to be back competing at world level again after a difficult spell with a knee injury last year, making a final and swimming a lifetime best I can’t complain with that.”

Lead Coach Jim Laverty said, “Jonathan swam superbly to qualify for tonight’s final, where he rose to the occasion and used all his experience to pull a PB out in the final and finish one place higher in 5th. We are very happy with the performances.”

Other local swimmers continued Northern Ireland’s run of successful performances.

Cookstown's partially sighted swimmer, Stephen Campbell was in action in both the 100m Freestyle and 100m Butterfly events. Campbell set a new personal best time of 1.12.47 in the heats of the 100m Butterfly and narrowly missed out on a final, finishing 9th overall. Stephen posted a time of 1.07.54 in the 100m Freestyle heats finishing in 11th position.

Matthew Bell and James Hamilton battled it out in the heats of the 100m Backstroke (S14 Class). Bell set a new personal best of 1.14.86 taking 2 seconds off his previous best while Hamilton finished with a time of 1.18.76 taking a huge 4 seconds of his previous mark.

 20th August 2010