Report by Caroline Makin
What a magnificent effort from our nine Vikings who travelled to Blacktown Aquatic Centre for the NSW State Long Distance LC Championships on Sunday, 16 November 2014. Our team finished in fourth place overall from 28 clubs who participated in this event and only 18 points behind the winning club!
The top six club’s points tally was as follows:
| 1 | NMR Merrylands |
168 |
| 1 | NML Manly |
168 |
| 3 | NSP Seaside Pirates |
153 |
| 4 | NTN Tuggeranong |
150 |
| 5 | NRY Ryde |
131 |
| 6 | NWG Warringah |
122 |
Our seven women and two men swum, time kept and officiated throughout the day from 9am until 5pm whilst 100+ swimmers from NSW/ACT travelled up and down the length of the 50m pool in a variety of strokes and distances ranging from 400m to 800m to 1500m.
Our swimmers commented about their swims …
ANN REID
50-54 800 M Butterfly 18:39.20
50-54 400 M Individual Medley 08:04.25
“Kind of Rhonda O’Donnell from Novocastrians to let me know that I could break the branch record with my first ever long course 800m Butterfly. She just happened to beat it a bit faster!”
BRENDA DAY
65-69 800 M Individual Medley 18:07.08
65-69 400 M Backstroke 08:33.85
“Absolutely no expectations, so I was delighted to swim 2 PBs – being totally relaxed seemed to be the key along with great support from my team mates.”
CAROLINE MAKIN
45-49 1500 M Freestyle 21:19.06
45-49 400 M Freestyle 05:26.90
“I was truly astounded at my time when I touched the wall in the 1500m Freestyle — I reckon it was the best swim of my life! A 2-minute PB plus significant PB’s in the 400m and 800m splits and backing up into an even quicker 400m Freestyle with a 200m PB in the split 5 hours later just made my day!”
GARY STUTSEL
75-79 800 M Backstroke 16:40.47
“Doing my 800m Backstroke 50 seconds faster than I expected was a great surprise and very rewarding. It seems that extended holidays, almost no pool time and a bad back may be the alternative method of training!”
KATRINA BURGESS
45-49 800 M Backstroke 13:19.72
45-49 400 M Butterfly 07:12.55
“It was a great weekend away and so lovely to spend time with Caz, Leisa and Suzie the night before the meet. My highlight was completing the 400m Butterfly and gaining the branch record.“
LEISA CASS
50-54 800 M Backstroke 16:01.56
50-54 400 M Breaststroke 08:23.89
“Two swims for two huge PB’s made it a great day of swimming for me. Taking 51 seconds off my PB for 800m Backstroke and then backing up for a 57 second PB in the 400m Breaststroke was fantastic.”
ROGER DIETRICH
50-54 1500 M Freestyle 32:42.03
50-54 400 M Freestyle 08:23.31
“I need the Club Captain to kick me up the backside and get to the pool and train! My lack of training resulted in pretty disappointing times in both my swims!!!”
SUZIE GUNNING
50-54 1500 M Freestyle 24:26.54
50-54 400 M Freestyle 06:27.44
“It was nice to be competing again and while my times were not great, I can hardly complain about a gold and a silver medal! It was great to see the other girls swimming so well. I was surprised to see they have covered the pool since I was there last time 4 years ago — just ask Caz about that one!”
TARA OLSTHOORN
30-34 1500 M Freestyle 25:14.00
“I swam as slow as a ‘tortoise’ as quoted by another swimmer but at 30 weeks pregnant I was happy just to gain 10 points to be added to the club tally.”
It was a very long day, but full of lots of great banter on the pool deck with other swimmers from NSW about their swims and their personal achievements and the Viking crew, as ever, supporting their club members in their endeavours!
Full results are available.
