The Cyril and Yvonne Wood cup - remembering a lovely couple

Cyril and Yvonne Wood, long term members of South London Swimming Club, joined the Serpentine SC in 1980 when Tooting Bec was under refurbishment.  They became fully ensconced with the club.  Yvonne would swim before races and then help with the judging.  Cyril, a strong swimmer, carried on racing into his late 80s.

Cyril was SSC President, 1995 - 98 and Hon. Handicapper 2001 - 2004.  In his role as handicapper Cyril introduced a "modern", scientific approach to the handicapper's art.  With his trusty assistant Yvonne, he could be seen, stopwatch in hand, giving a running commentary of the proceedings into a cassette tape recorder hung around his neck, which he would download and then hand out detailed result sheets the following week, down to the last second, all punched out on his old Department of Education typewriter. 

This was quite some contrast to the previous "back of an envelope" approach, with handicaps produced on the morning of a race, depending on who had turned up.  Mind you, the number of racers was somewhat lower then.

In 1994 Cyril and Yvonne were part of a band of faithful members, including Bill Deely, Justin Fahy, and Mark Fraser to swim with the St Petersburg Walruses. They were initiated into the club by 'King Neptune' himself, after completing a 50 meter swim cut out of the ice, 450mm thick on a lake, not far from St. Petersburg.

Serpentine swimmer Clare Doyle was intrumental in organising the trip, using her contacts in the Russian city.  Though not formally a member of the club at that time, Clare was a Lido regular and continued to swim early mornings out of season at a time when there were no separate facilites for women so had to enjoy the delights of changing in the, albeit large, disabled toilet.

South Londoners Cyril and Yvonne were introduced to each other early in WW2 by one of Yvonne's brothers.  Yvonne was a great athlete. She was County standard in the high jump, though her mother saw this as "unladylike" and was more keen for her to concentrate on the track.   Progression beyond county level was thus curtailed.

Soon after they met Cyril was sent out to the Far East and was one of General Slim's "Forgotten Army ". Mike Olizar notes: "I remember him telling me that when the atom bombs were dropped on Japan his Colonel called the men together saying " Don't worry boys you'll see action yet ".  'Silly old fool' was the response."  

I also recall the story told by Cyril with respect to the promise by his Colonel that he would ensure they saw action even though the Japanese were on the cusp of surrender.  Cyril will always be remembered to all in the club as an absolute gentleman, yet his telling of the story involved language I never heard him utter before or since.  He really was speaking from the heart.  They had got through safely to the end, and were not at all happy that their gung-ho Colonel was going to rob them of a happy return back to Blighty.  (Brian)

During the war Cyril and Yvonne kept in touch by letters which of course took a long time to reach destination. Soon after Japan's surrender Cyril was demobbed and they married in 1947. Yvonne was working for the Pullman train car company and as a wedding present the company gave them a pullman car railway ticket to Swanage where they spent their honeymoon.  During the sixty plus years of their marraige they hardly spent a night separated.  When asked about the secret of the success and longevity of their marriage, Cyril said this was down to two simple words -  "Yes dear".

In 2012 Yvonne joined Cyril as a club vice President in recognition of her many years of service, dedication and good cheer.