Ledbury and District Swimming Club's representatives in the Wyvern League were celebrating their second round win at Monmouth on Saturday night.

A 32-point lead over closest rivals Hereford set their hopes high of retaining the trophy at the final in May.

LADASC were off to a cracking start with the 11-year-old relay teams of Joe Bloxsome, Chris Leitch, George Parsons, David Middleton, Alice Parsons, Patty Holloway, Lucy Stokes and Caitlin Clark setting a blistering pace to win the first two events by a clear five metres.

Fast swimming by Chepstow nudged the older girls, Hannah Bloxsome, Hannah Kirby, Emily Klimek and Alison Pudge, into second place but the boys' team of Rhys Davey, Ruari Smith Cooper, Luke Rycroft and Arron Almond, put Ledbury back at the top with some fast swimming to touch less than half a second ahead of the Hereford squad.

Breaststroke proved to be Ledbury's strength with winning swims from Fred van Vuren and Sally Fitzpatrick (10/u), George and Rose Parsons (11/u), James Middleton (13/u) and Emma Fitzpatrick and Luke Rycroft (15/u).

Once again, the youngsters of the team were invincible in the nine years age group, with good discipline and sound techniques, Laura Quigley, Leah Heath, Sally Fitzpatrick, Gemma Laing, Alexander Middleton, William Owen, Ben Butler and Billy Wilce relished their victories in both their freestyle and medley relays, amassing a precious 24 points.

The freestyle events were all closely contested with LADASC swimmers, Eloise van Vuren, Tom Stokes, David Middleton and Gemma Laing recording wins whilst Patty Holloway, Daniel Adair and Thomas Stokes were triumphant in the backstroke races. Midway through the gala, Ledbury had secured a 12-point lead over Hereford with Cwmbran, Chepstow and Monmouth all vying for third place.

There was some exciting racing in the butterfly with all the LADASC team showing great determination to add to the points tally. Michael Adair knocked two seconds off his best time to win the 10/u age group whilst team-mate Leah Heath also swam a best time but was pipped to the touch.

In the next age group, improved times by Joe Bloxsome and Lucy Stokes gave them first places over the 25m event.

The 13 and 15 years swimmers, Katie Batley, Thomas Stokes, Hannah Bloxsome and Rhys Davey, had a longer distance of two lengths and all swam well with improved times for Davey and Stokes, both in first place, whilst the girls were just not strong enough, finishing second and third.

More success in the relays, helped along by some gutsy swims from Jake Kirby, Iain Docherty, Rosie Owen and Katherine Berry, meant that LADASC were unbeatable by the concluding event, the age group cannon.

Swimmers for this event are selected by being the fastest in their age group relays earlier in the evening.

Leah Heath and Michael Adair took the honours for the nine-year-olds, both swimming hard with all teams making it very close in the opening stages. Gemma Laing and Daniel Adair represented the 10/u swimmers, again swimming strongly and managing a small gain on some of the opponents.

Hereford unconventionally chose to swim their team out of age order which made it impossible for the young swimmers to keep abreast of their older ones.

LADASC remained unfazed by this tactic and concentrated on their own performance. Following fast lengths by Patty Holloway and George Parsons, the gap began to close.

With tremendous vocal support from their team-mates and supporters, Emma Fitzpatrick and Thomas Stokes turned the tables to give the final swimmers, Alison Pudge and Luke Rycroft sufficient lead to finish the gala off in great style, bringing the winning total points to 278.

Hereford were runners up with 246, Cwmbran 175, Chepstow 170 and Monmouth 164.