2023 Decathlon

Six swims from just two Masters Meets were enough to catapult Matt Wright into third place in the 2023 Beds Decathlon competition as our Men once more remained the highest ranking team in the County. Karen retained her position as our highest ranking female, once again claiming fifth place in the County.

In what was his last year of representing Team Luton following his permanent relocation to Cornwall it was rather fitting to see Malcolm Barton once again feature in the Club’s top four. He thereby assisted the Men in claiming second spot to Team Anglia in the East Region’s Top Men’s team competition. Despite their advancing years both Malcolm and Alastair Gibb achieved their highest personal decathlon score for some time.

Dave Wright’s swim in the November Inter County Masters’ competition was just sufficient to see him claim the fourth spot overtaking John O’Rourke and Sam Bradley who had jostled for that position throughout the year. It also saw Dave complete his unbroken run in the Decathlon of featuring every year in the Club’s top four highest ranking males.

BEDS RANKING
2023 (2022)
GB RANKING
2023 (2022)
NAMEAGE
(2023)
2023 POINTS
(NO. OF EVENTS)
2022 POINTS
(NO.OF EVENTS)
2020/21 POINTS
(NO. OF EVENTS)
3rd (-)149th (-)Matthew Wright253,653 (6)
4th (5th)174th (152nd)Alastair Gibb633,499 (10)3,310 (10)3,413 (10)
6th (13th)336th (517th)Malcolm Barton682,699 (9)2,115 (7)1,840 (5)
10th (4th)540th (116th)Dave Wright622,207 (5)3,561 (8)3,126 (7)
13th (12th)700th (499th)John O'Rourke541,888 (8)2,154 (9)
14th (15th)731st (601st)Sam Bradley301,849 (10)1,964 (10)1,685 (8)
15th (14th)797th (537th)Colin Mayes681,761 (5)2,073 (5)2,038 (5)
24th (2nd)1,407th (22nd)Graham Powell671,057 (2)5,208 (10)2,145 (4)

For a variety of reasons, our female representation and total number of qualifying races at Masters meets was somewhat depleted  compared to prior years, as was the case with their male counterparts.

Karen nevertheless less took the bait that was thrown down, seeing her complete the full quota of ten events and achieve her highest personal total points score since 2019.  The trio of Karen ,Jo and Michelle still managed to secure the fourth highest total of Beds Ladies in the female team competition. Their points total would have been marginally higher as Kelly Cooke’s only Masters’ competitive swims in January 2023 were completed as a Team Luton swimmer but attributed to Truro (as she has also relocated to Cornwall).

BEDS RANKING
2023 (2022)
GB RANKING
2023 (2022)

NAME

AGE
(2023)

2023 POINTS
(NO. OF EVENTS)

2022 POINTS
(NO. OF EVENTS)

2020/21 POINTS
(NO. OF EVENTS)
5th (5th)127th (100th)Karen MacKenzie503,650 (10)3,560 (9)1,621 (4)
10th (-)550th (-)Jo Mitchinson441,844 (4)3,196 (6)
17th (16th)949th (625th)Michelle Neal431,147 (3)1,571 (4)1,472 (4)
(-) (11th)(-) (351st)Kelly Cooke472,203 (5)1,781 (4)
(-) (21st)(-) (875th)Lorraine Sadler521,138 (5)
(-) (26th)(-) (1,369th)Sharon Thompson56415 (2)
Alice Pinney241,330 (4)
Laura Smith291,120 (3)