Sunday of course was Remembrance Day and no doubt this proud World War II veteran would have joined his mates for the various ceremonies which took place on that day and swimming would have been the last thing on his mind.

Thus, Colonel Pat was most certainly excused from performing his usual journalistic duties at the pool on such an auspicious occasion.

Speaking of veterans, it would be remiss of me if I didn't record the fact our patron Angus Spalding celebrated his 85th birthday on November 7.

Angus joined the Ducks in 1969 and was awarded life membership in 1975.

He has had about 1800 swims with the club.

However, The Colonel has one ace up his sleeve when it comes to being our most senior member.

He delights in reminding Gus that at 87 years of age he can rightly claim the title of the Dubbo Ducks' most senior citizen.

Back at headquarters, it was reported the recent bi-annual visit to the Harbord Diggers Swimming Club was most successful. One of the highlights was that our very own nursing student, Lucy Taylor, celebrated her 19th birthday during the weekend and we made sure this special day was one to remember for Lucy by partying well into the night at the Manly 16-foot skiff club.

With The Colonel and his Apprentice among the tourists to Harbord, there were still enough members (who did not travel) to have their own little carnival at the pool.

Briefly, the results of that day's program are as follows:

o 25m freestyle final, a dead heat for first between Matthew Yeo and David Sparkes (no surprise there), each recording 24.69 seconds.

o The 4x25m breaststroke/freestyle brace relay was won by Mark Bonser and Jacob Pearce, while the final event, a 2x25m backstroke/breaststroke went to Jacob Pearce ahead of John Wherritt and Mark Scullard.

Boy, didn't the table have a field day putting all that together.

And now, on to last Sunday's results; Patricia Spalding is one of a select group of members (and the only lady) to have won all three races on the one day.

Again on Sunday she showed just how good she is by winning the Radio 2DU/ZooFM monthly trophy, swimming exactly to her handicap time, 0.00s.

It doesn't get any better than that.

Good handicapping by Mark Scullard saw only four of the 26 starters break their time in the opening event, the usual 25m freestyle.

Garry Giddings showed that all the exercise he gets chasing that little white ball around the golf course no doubt helped him swim an excellent 0.01s in winning his heat.

However, he did not progress any further and it was left to the club's number one swimmer, Mark Scullard to take out the final in 0.23s just touching out Josh Bird 0.26s.

Letting their imagination run wild, the table came up with a back/breast brace relay as the penultimate race on the program.

With all the heats decided the final took pride of place and here our brand new doctor Kara Gray teamed up with The Apprentice (Reg Ferguson ) to gladly accept the winning vouchers.

The Apprentice humbly gave all the credit to Kara for achieving this victory. Paul Sinclair and David Sparkes finished second, Mark Scullard and Garry Giddings third.

A straight-out final followed the heats of the program's third event, a 50m freestyle.

No breakers here, the five finalists giving it their all.

Paul Sinclair, who joined the Ducks in 1960, and was awarded life membership in 1980, was a very popular winner.

First of the losers was Glenn Swane and third was birthday girl, Lucy Taylor.

Congratulations to Neil Cullen on winning the October points score with 35 points.

Second on 34 points was Judy Walsh, Craig Schloeffel, Garry Giddings and Reg Ferguson.

The head of the Schloeffel clan, farmer Brian with 33 points, also collected a voucher which also applied to the lucky number winners, Jeffrey Dawes, David Sparkes, Garry Giddings and Reg Ferguson

Members are reminded of some very important events coming up and for which urgent attention is required, particularly notification of your attendance or otherwise.

Our annual Clive Roots Relay Carnival will be held on Thursday, November 22 starting at 6.30pm.

Co-coordinator Mark Scullard would like progress to be well advanced by Sunday's monthly meeting.

Attendance numbers are also being taken for our Christmas Party and the Western Districts AIF Championships on February 10, 2013 and the national AIF Carnival at Nelson Bay on March 8 to 11, 2013.

The Olympic pool has been booked for January 13 and 27, plus February 24 in an effort to obtain accurate times for the above carnivals.