The Tribune

By RENALDO DORSETT

Sports Reporter

rdorsett@tribunemedia.net

FOR an unprecedented sixth consecutive year, Swift Swimming has claimed the Bahamas Swimming Federation’s National Championship, presented by RBC.

Swift concluded the 45th edition of the four-day meet last night at the Betty Kelly Kenning Aquatic Centre with a total of 1768.50 points, 157 points ahead of the Barracuda Swim Club who finished second with 1611.50 points.

Alpha Aquatics Swim Club was third with 860 points, Freeport Aquatic Club was fourth with 789 points and Team Orca closed out the top five with 457.50 points.

The remainder of the field included Abaco Swim Club in sixth with 423 points, The Dolphin Swimming club seventh with 415, Blue Marlin Aquatics eighth with 225, Sea Waves Aquatic Team ninth with 83, Lyford Cay Swim Club 10th with 68.50 and St Anne’s School Blue Waves with six.

Surrounded by his swimmers donning special t-shirts commemorating the prestigious achievement of six straight, Swift head coach Andy Knowles said it was fulfilling for the group to emerge once again with the win.

“It’s something we really worked hard on all year. Our goal was to win six in a row because no one had ever done that. We’ve won five, Barracuda has won five, but this is the first time a team has been able to go six in a row. At the beginning of the season we definitely had some age groups we were very weak in, and it was good to see so many of those kids making finals in some of those age groups where a lot of people may had written us off,” he said. “We do our homework, we plan the whole year, we look at the events we try to cover and we work on getting those kids to swim those events the whole year. We try to keep in contact with our swimmers that are away. They are always doing real well and when everyone is home we are big and strong so we see the result of that, being able to pull off six in a row and complete the goal.”

While in the midst of the celebration of number six, Knowles said the group is already looking ahead to preparation for continuing the streak.

“I’ve been around this sport for about 55 years and it’s always just as hard to keep focus and maintain momentum. My wife and I do it together. We seem to cover the coaching and administrative aspects,” he said. “We have great coaches coming up through the pipeline, so all that makes it easier to keep going and supplement all the hard work these kids put into this day in and day out.”

Swift produced four high point trophy winners in their respective divisions.

Logan Roberts took the girls under-8 with 55 points, Katelyn Cabral won the girls 11-12 with 57 points, Darren Laing won the boys 13-14 with 62 points and Albury Higgs took the girls 15 and over division with 65 points.

Lamar Taylor of Freeport Aquatic, swimming in the boys 11-12 division, was the overall high point winner with 90 points.

Other division winners included Tre Moncur (Barracudas) in the boys under-8 with 37, Abayomi Brown (Freeport Aquatic) with 86 points in the girls 9-10, Nigel Forbes (Freeport Aquatic) with 79 points in the boys 9-10, Anya MacPhail (Barracudas) with 75 points in the girls 13-14, and Matthew Lowe (Barracudas) with 61 points to take the boys 15 and over.

The highlight of the meet was the Olympic qualifying standards achieved by Joanna Evans and Arianna Vanderpool-Wallace.

Evans, who recently completed her freshman season at the University of Texas, achieved the FINA “A” standard of 8:33.97 secs in the 800 free, taking the event in 8:32.19 secs.

She also achieved the “B” standard of 4:17.80 secs in the 400m free with her finals time of 4:17.37 secs.

Vanderpool-Wallace surpassed the “A” standard of 25.28 secs in the 50m free with her time of 24.94 secs. In the 100m free, she surpassed the “B” standard 56.34 secs with her finals time of 54.52 secs.

BSF President Algernon Cargill said the federation was pleased to be able to host four days of record breaking competition.

He said the development of the national development programme has been due in large part to the partnership with RBC which has now extended more than three decades. However, further assistance from corporate Bahamas and a change in perception must be made among the Bahamian public if the sport will continue to develop.

“We are very happy with the long term support of RBC. For 32 years they have sponsored the National Swimming Championships and for the last five years the academic All-Bahamian award and this is the longest private enterprise sponsorship of a sporting organisation in the Bahamas. What we are happy about is that RBC continually increases its support and it’s very indicative of our athletes and their performances,” he said.

He said one of the highlights of the meet as always was the appearance of Vanderpool-Wallace as the top star to make a splash and now joined by Evans as a fellow Olympian.

“It’s an inspiration to the young swimmers because we want them to know that they got a start at these championships. So if they made it to the Olympic stage and now excel on the professional level, it can be done,” Cargill said. “One of the first things we have to do is change the incorrect perception that swimming is an elitist sport. We have a diverse group of swimmers from all educational backgrounds and one of the things that hurts recruiting new athletes at times is people thinking that this sport is just ‘for rich people.’ That is simply not true. We embrace learning development, we promote education and also we want to provide Bahamians to get an education beyond the high school level, into the tertiary level. We need corporate Bahamas to continue to come forward and invest in our young people.”