However, the club’s largest turn out at a single meet this season saw seven swimmers compete at the ‘All Junior’ sprint competition heats held at the new Wangaratta outdoor pool on Sunday, February 7.
It was a perfect day for swimming – warm for competitors and not too hot for spectators and officials.At these heats the top 8 from each age group in each event go through to the semi-finals in Melbourne in mid-March.
Four of our swimmers qualified with brothers Harrison and Oliver Just both making it through in three events each and achieving a swag of personal bests as they went.
Katelin Baker is also off to Melbourne with three qualifying times, having followed up a cracker of a season in which she racked up many placings – including a large number of first places. In between swim club activities Katelin and Oliver also managed to smash a number of school records, while Harrison and Katelin achieved ‘blue’ level and Oliver ‘bronze’ level in Swim Australia’s Junior Excellence (JX) program for 2019-20.
Within the JX program, junior swimmers strive to achieve gold, silver, bronze or blue standard times when they compete throughout the year, with swimming clinics offered throughout the year in every state and territory.
This program provides junior swimmers with access to a host of elite role models, including the program’s national ambassador – Dolphin Jack McLoughlin – along with receiving live recognition of achievements via Swimming Australia’s Swim Central online portal and program merchandise.
Also participating at the All Junior heats were long-term club swimmer Imogen Letchford and relatively new members Alex Graham and siblings Nick and Rylee Tukuniu.
While not qualifying for Melbourne Imogen and Alex continued to achieve personal bests in most or all of their events. This was Nick and Rylee’s first competitive meet and they both conducted themselves well – it is evident that with continued stroke refinement these two will prove to be excellent sprinters.
After a rocky start in the 50m freestyle Nick tore down the pool from last place as if pursued by a rocket to easily take out his heat and earn a spot in the semis.
The club’s final meet for the summer season is the Ovens and Murray individual championships swum over two days, originally on February 14-15 postponed to February 27-28, sadly clashing with the Relay Championships which have had to be cancelled. Both Imogen and Kaitlyn will hopefully represent Corowa in the individual events and we wish them luck.
The club looks forward to the opening of the new Corowa Aquatic Centre and hopes to continue training through winter as well as significantly expanding the squads next summer. Expressions of interest are invited via the Club’s Facebook page: Corowa Sharks Swimming Club.
As a general rule swimmers (of any age, including adults) are expected to be able to swim a recognised stroke for at least 25m. Enquiries may be directed to one of the coaches: Robyn Moore 0408 991 708 or Sharon Letchford 0458 080 405.
