Swimmers surge ahead at SI champs

Blenheim Swimming Club members made good use of hometown pool familiarity when the South Island Short Course champs were staged at Stadium 2000 recently.

Leading the way in the 11-strong local contingent was Nicola Lovell, who picked up a gold and silver medal, creating personal bests in the 100 butterfly and 200 backstroke events. Her sister, Jessica Lovell, sped to a gold medal in the 200m fly, Will Atkinson claimed gold and silver in the 100m and 50m fly events, Jack Love grabbed a silver and bronze, medalling in the 200IM, 100 fly and 200m back, while Carys McNabb claimed a bronze in the 100m fly.

Five other BSC swimmers achieved PBs - Anna Love (200m free, 100m free and 50 free); Gus Marfell (400m, 200m and 50m free); Finn McNabb (100m breast); Arthur Pinheiro (50m free) and Ethan Spencer (200m free), the latter pair in their first meet of this magnitude.

Max Skehan reached the finals of the 50m free and 50m back.

Overall, 215 of the top swimmers from the Mainland participated. Canterbury came out as the top region while Wharenui was the top club with 11 or more swimmers entered. The top club with 10 or less swimmers entered was Triton.

Five new national para records were set by Charlotte Rozen from Wharenui (50m, 100m and 200m breast and 100m IM) plus Brooke Anderson, from the Vikings club, (200m free).

There are no South Island records broken, however there were five new Swimming Nelson Marlborough age group records set, by Jessica Lovell (18 years 50m back), Madeleine Seymour (17 years 100m back) and Lucas Bell (16 years 200m breast and 100m IM and 200m IM).

Two new Nelson Marlborough Open records were achieved, by Madeleine Seymour in the 100m back and Lucas Bell in the 200m breaststroke.

BSC coach Shane Skehan said that the swimmers were training hard and performed strongly in their build up towards National Short Course Champs in Auckland in September.

Club President Lowri McNabb thanked all the volunteers who helped run the local events.

“We are so lucky to have the continued, strong support of Stadium 2000 and the local swimming community when we host these events. Two hundred swimmers plus their coaches, team managers and supporters provide a significant boost to the Blenheim economy during the winter months and we appreciate all the teams travelling, especially the 40 swimmers who came all the way from Southland.”

Two weeks previously the top swimmers from the Marlborough Nelson region competed with each other for age group medals.

The 34-strong Blenheim swimmers competed strongly, with Riley Guildford and Nicola Lovell claiming age group trophies in the 10-and-under and 15-and-over age groups respectively.

Several other BSC members swam personal bests in every event they competed in – namely Charlie Salway, Gus Marfell, Tia Hickman, Blake Kirby, Daniel Baker, Harriet d’Auvergne, Charlotte d’Auvergne and Anna Love.

Another highlight was the performances of the Blenheim relay teams, who more than held their own against the larger and stronger Nelson clubs.

In the senior 15-and-over division, Blenheim put two teams onto the podium in the 4x100 freestyle relay.

For more information on the Blenheim Swimming Club and how you can get involved, see their website www.blenheimswimmingclub.com