Camps History from the founder - Laurie Dormer (ASA Coach) 

The story of Swim Week started when I began my coaching career in Middlesex and wanted to do something unheard of at that time.  Run a training camp for my club’s swimmers and their parents away from home. I felt then and still do that “a change is as good as a rest" and that the opportunity for the whole family to join together in one activity is priceless.

I travelled all over the country looking for a suitable venue and settled on Butlins Holiday Camp near Margate. 100 members of the club had a wonderful week there in the early 1950’s. Like topsy it grew and grew until I took over the Crystal Palace Pool and the Hostel for a week. I decided to develop the idea and open it up to swimmers from other clubs. 

During the 1990’s we generated more than 1,000 swimmers and their families from dozens of clubs and took over the whole of the facilities at Pontins at Southport. The idea being that we could swim twice a day and have a fun holiday at the same time. We were using 4 swimming pools in the area and had more than 24 hours a day of water time!

A fleet of buses transported swimmers to their sessions and my coaching / teaching team consisted of more than 20. When Pontins decided late in 1999 that they wanted to revert to catering for the general public, and not solely for my event we had to find other alternatives and the Malta warm weather training camp was born whilst in the U.K we relocated to Berwick Holiday Park. 

Over the years literally hundreds of swimmers and parents have started out on their coaching career at our camps via the ASA certification courses we have run and swimmers who attended swim weeks in the 50’s and 60’s are now bringing their children to learn to swim  or to train with the squads.  Friendships of many years standing were generated on these camps and almost everyone who has attended has gone away with a new attitude both to training and to our wonderful sport.

The theme in 2008 is the same as it was at the outset! To offer to swimmers of all standards both young and old a swimming based holiday with the whole family catered for at which high quality training, teaching and coaching would be provided. 

The key elements are swimming with new faces, varied and stimulating work, fresh challenges, making new friends and above all Having Fun Doing It! In 2008 we are running two weeks simultaneously for the first time. One for the South and one for the North both sited in great holiday destinations. The format is the same, the only changes being the venues.

My Son Luke and I are totally committed to excellence and both firmly believe that stroke skills form the basis of success in competitive swimming. Hence we focus on that area at all levels whether it be learn to swim or National standard squads. We do not believe that this means that you abandon achieving metres or that you don’t work the energy systems and we make sure that these criteria receive due attention too.