Super fish Sam Manwaring has been breaking records in the pool, the most recent of which came last weekend at the NSW Junior State Age SC Championships at Sydney Olympic Park Aquatic Centre (SOPAC).
The 13-year-old Sam – who is in Year Eight at Murrumburrah High School, qualified to swim in two events, the 100 and 200 metre breaststroke, a wonderful achievement in itself, and came away with two top-ten ribbons and two significant personal bests.
Sam’s results from last Saturday’s events included: 10th – Boys U/13 100m Breaststroke: 1:15.77, dropping over 3 seconds off his seed time. 8th – Boys U/13 200m Breaststroke: 2:47.94, dropping a whopping 6.56 seconds off his seed time.
Sam finished 6.12 seconds off the leader Riley Marcellino (1:09.65) in the 100 metre Breaststroke and 14.65 seconds off the pace in the 200 metre Breaststroke again behind Marcellino in first (2:33.29).
Cootamundra Swimming and Lifesaving Clubs Publicity Officer Melissa Westaway said Sam has been putting in the hard work in the winter to achieve his results for this season.
“Sam’s been training over the winter at the Cootamundra Indoor Pool with the leisure and recreation group. He trains three days a week in the performance squad there with coaches Adam Gammon, Angus Westaway and Fiona Falconer,” Melissa said.
“It’s a very impressive achievement to knock seconds off his times. It’s quite a hard qualifying meet to get into. It’s just a drop below nationa
ls in a sense.
To be able to swim there, they have to get under a certain time. It’s the top swimmers in the state competing there, not everyone can go and compete there.”
Sam will be continuing to improve his times further in the upcoming weeks and months before competing at his next meet.
“Sam will be continuing to train as he is at the moment until the outdoor pool, where he’ll up his training.
He’s a very passionate, dedicated swimmer. He’s a really good role model with the kids so he gets in and puts in 100 per cent all the time,” Melissa continued.
“He’ll be wanting to further continue and grow and getting a good base behind him. He’s swimming against kids who were probably in the pool over winter up to 10 sessions a week, so he’s doing really well.
“He’ll be wanting to make all the qualifying meets again this year. Because he goes up an age group, the times will be dropping again so he’ll have to improve even further.
“At the moment we just train in the afternoons between 5pm-7pm. They’ll probably go up to five or six sessions over the summer period depending on our coaches availability and lane space.
“Sam will be upping his sessions and doing a whole range of aerobic and anaerobic workouts. Some of the sessions can be up to eight kilometres a swim.”
Well done Sam on your recent success and he hope to hear more about your achievements going forward!
Tim Warren