A swimming gala is a swimming competition between clubs or groups of swimmers, usually of young people. This term is primarily used in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

, and

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

. In

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

''swimming carnival'' is the norm.

Overview

In the UK swimming galas are traditionally held at the end of the summer and through the autumn. Typical groups that compete at galas include

school A school is the educational institution (and, in the case of in-person learning, the Educational architecture, building) designed to provide learning environments for the teaching of students, usually under the direction of teachers. Most co ...

Girl Guides Girl Guides (or Girl Scouts in the United States and some other countries) are organisations within the Scout Movement originally and largely still for girls and women only. The Girl Guides began in 1910 with the formation of Girlguiding, The ...

and

Scouts Scouting or the Scout Movement is a youth social movement, movement which became popularly established in the first decade of the twentieth century. It follows the Scout method of informal education with an emphasis on practical outdoor activi ...

other youth groups and between swimming clubs and between individual swimmers. As well as the usual swimming events, there are sometimes more fun or unusual events such as swimming backwards or varieties of mixed relays and special races are often staged for the group leaders. This could also be extended to others as well as leaders many others will have a go at the race. Swimming galas serve several purposes including competition, fund raising Whitney and District Swimming Club - Fundraising gala
and social bonding. There are a variety of galas, some of which are listed here. League galas are a set of galas (often three) between different clubs where in each race points are awarded, and whichever club get the most points win and get promoted to the next division. County galas are for individual swimmers that have achieved the qualifying times and wish to compete at a county level. After these come regional galas which have the same concept as county galas but for bigger areas so they have faster qualifying times. The next stage up are national galas which are for the best swimmers in the country. Open galas are galas hosted by clubs/organizations to raise money. Other galas include club galas which include swimmers from the same club competing against each other and galas hosted purely for fun.

References

gala {{Swimming-stub