Organised by the East Riding School Sport Partnership, the gala combined solo races with team events for students from 12 East Riding secondary schools.

Each student completed two solo races using either front crawl, backstroke, or breaststroke, while team events included relay races.

Withernsea’s team comprised students who are members of external swimming clubs, or who are competent swimmers in their own right.

Nick Richmond, school sports coordinator, said: “We really wanted to enter a team this year to help support our young swimmers, promote a new sporting opportunity and participate in a county competition. Our involvement in the swimming gala was the result of feedback gathered through the school’s Board for Change. This indicated that students are keen to explore a wider variety of sports, with swimming being one of the sports that students suggested they would like to see more of.”

Over the past 18 months, regular opportunities for inexperienced swimmers to access free lessons at East Riding Leisure, Withernsea, have been offered to Year 7 and 8 students as part of the school’s extra-curricular activities programme. These lessons have been targeted at students who either have no experience or cannot swim more than 50m.