As usual a great deal of expectation met with results or vice versa at the 2013 Masters Swimming National Championships in Sydney. It was an action packed four days starting with 800 Freestyle and ending with 200 Fly plus relays for those with enough energy left to compete.
North Sydney swimmers won the sartorial stakes in their red and white and among other achievements collected three National Records.
Firstly, congratulations to Neal Moores who set 2 National Records in the 50 Fly (27:89) and 100 Fly (1:02:15). The latter was a second faster than the national record Neal set at Blacktown a few weeks ago. The other National record was set by the Men’s 4 x 50 freestyle relay in the 200 – 239 age group. Congratulations to Greg Philips, John Wynberg, Neal Moores and John Kain.
The reward for many North Sydney swimmers after months of hard work in the pool were medals galore. Jan Taylor, Mel Speet, Sarah Koch, Alice Wilson, Andrew Graham, John Kain, John Wynberg, John de Vries, Luke Ranson, Greg Philips, Jonathon Roberts, Neal Moores, Christina Echols, Isla Hale and okay…. me. If I’ve left anyone out my apologies.
Apart from medals many of us swam PBs. Luke Parr was ecstatic over his 50 free (28:87). Andrew Graham did PBs for all his swims.
The bravery award goes to Isla Hale and Joe Watkins who stepped up for the 200 Fly which was the last individual event of the meet. Isla swam a well built race and Joe being well built swam an evenly paced 200 Fly. Well done you two!!
A big thanks goes to coaches John Wynberg, Steve Badger and Hiroto Homma for their support and encouragement.
Check out some great photos taken throughout the meet at this link: http://bazzat.photomerchant.net/photo-library
The results are posted on the NSW Aussi Masters website. Take some time to look through the results of all our swimmers and congratulate them on their fantastic efforts.
We have more carnivals coming up. Ettalong (short course) on Saturday May 11th and Wett Ones at Sydney Uni ( long course) on Saturday May 25th . There are not that many Long course carnivals until the end of the year so enter Wett Ones if you’re wanting to improve on your National times or compete for your club.
Soon we will be rallying swimmers for the relay carnival on Sunday July 21st. This will be the major focus for the next few months. It really needs to involve all of us to be successful so please set aside Sunday July 21st for a great day of fun and sportsmanship. Last year we came 3rd in the overall pointscore but with more swimmers we can improve on this because it’s all about the numbers and having a go.