About the GoCardless Swim England National County Team Championships

The County Team Champs is always a fun, colourful and competitive event played out in front of a packed house in Sheffield’s Ponds Forge.

It kicks off the competitive short course season for many of the swimmers taking part and you can keep up with it all here.

More than 900 swimmers compete from over 30 counties with races going on in two pools at the same time.

What is the format of the competition?

The County Team Championships is split into two divisions. Division 1 typically has 20 teams while Division 2 has up to 20.

The event takes place in two short course (25m) pools at the same time – one for Division 1 races, the other for Division 2.

There will be two heats for each event on the schedule with heats in Division 2 starting about 20 seconds after those of Division 1.

The heats for individual races will be seeded according to entry times but the team events will be randomly drawn.

Individual events are contested over three age groups – 12/13 Yrs, 14/15 Yrs and 16/17 Yrs. There are 100m Freestyle, 100m Backstroke, 100m Butterfly and 100m Breaststroke events for each age group with one swimmer competing from each county.

There will also be 4x50m Medley Relays held for each age group and one Mixed 6x50m Freestyle Relay. The mixed relay consists of teams made up of one open/male and one female from each age group.

• Click here to view news reports from previous competitions.

How does the scoring work?

Point scoring is by place with first place worth 20 points, second place worth 19 points, third worth 18 and so on. This scoring continues right through to one point for 20th.

However, if a swimmer is disqualified, they receive no points.

At the end of the competition, the bottom four teams from Division 1 are relegated to Division 2 for next year’s event. The top four from Division 2 replacing them in the top flight.

• Still confused? Head to our Results Archive to view results from previous stagings of the competition.