Report by Bill Eversham
On Saturday 29 October 2016, we held our final ACT Interclub Meet for the year at Gungahlin Leisure Centre. This was a long course meet and dual-hosted with Molonglo Water Dragons in the late afternoon. 37 swimmers registered to compete. This comprised 18 swimmers from Molonglo Water Dragons, 3 swimmers from Ginninderra Masters, one swimmer from Novocastrians, one from Wett Ones and 14 swimmers from our club, Tuggeranong Vikings. However, there were a few withdrawals on the day, which often happens.
There were six events on the program followed by a couple of freestyle relays. The events were:
- 200m Choice of Stroke
- 50m Backstroke
- 50m Freestyle
- 50m Butterfly
- 50m Breaststroke
- 100m Choice of Stroke
We used three lanes for racing and the entire program was relaxed and enjoyable. Our club also provided a number of officials to assist running the event.
As always in these events there was a constant call for timekeepers, and swimmers had to juggle volunteering to time keep, warming up for their next event and also racing. The efforts of everybody to assist officials duties and timekeeping was very much appreciated.
In regards to our Vikings swimmers we achieved the following:
In Event 1: 200m Choice of Stroke there were 21 swimmers entered for a variety of strokes. Denise Druitt put in a big effort to swim 200m Freestyle and received much encouragement from our club members during the event and swimming about 17 seconds faster than her entry time. Well done Denise. Donna Campbell, Brenda Day, Jane Waddleton and Jeanette Droop also put in big swims. Jane swam 200m Breaststroke and Donna, Brenda and Jeanette swam 200m Backstroke. Alana Doran also swam a strong 200m Freestyle. Alana from Novocastrians club has recently moved from Newcastle to Canberra and has started swimming and training with our club.
Event 2: 50m Backstroke, saw four swimmers from our club taking part: Caroline Makin, Annette Britten, Kristen Leydon and Jane Waddleton. Most swimmers finished close to their entry times and it was good to see Annette, who always helps coordinates our local competitions, back in the water and competing.
Event 3: 50m Freestyle, had a strong field with five of our club’s swimmers competing. Kristen Leydon, Donna Campbell, Jeanette Droop and Denise Druitt all put in good swims and Richard Phillips did his first swim of the day with a pretty lively 33.57 seconds. Alana Doran also swam a nice 50m Freestyle.
Event 4: 50m Butterfly had three Vikings swimmers – Kristen Leydon, iron lady Brenda Day and Jeanette Droop – who all took on this challenging sprint event.
Event 5, 50m Breaststroke had three Vikings swimming: Caroline Makin, Jane (Ms Breaststroke) Waddleton and Richard Phillips. All swimmers showed their technique and some solid times and Caroline amazingly swum 16 seconds faster than her entry time of 01.01.00 — hmmmmm maybe a typo in putting her entry in … or was it slightly deliberate?!!
Event 6: 100m Choice of Stroke, had the biggest field of the day 26 entries with six Vikings (Denise Druitt, Brenda Day, Richard Phillips, Donna Campbell, Caroline Makin and Annette Britten) swimming. Denise, Brenda and Richard swam Freestyle with Richard showing his hard work in training paying off and a very good time of 1.16.67. Donna swam Breaststroke and Caroline and Annette swam Backstroke.
The final events of the day were the Relays, which enjoyed the usual last minute pre-relay event confusion and chaos but somehow all swimmers turned up at the right ends of the pool at the right time. Our Vikings ladies team of Jeanette, Brenda, Denise and Kristen (200-239 age group) swam the 4x50m Freestyle relay in 3.38.84.
Full results are available to download.
The overall point score went to Molonglo Water Dragons who had more swimmers than Tuggernong Vikings for the first time in six years …. read Gary Stutsel’s self proclaimed slightly biased Molonglo Dragons report!
Overall it was a good afternoon and we all had fun. A final thanks to our club members who acted as officials and to visiting officials because without them we would not have had an event.
Looking forward to some more ACT Interclub Meets in 2017 with a big contingent of Vikings.
