ESP swimmers end season on high note
He won four gold and one bronze medal, qualifying for 11 finals, scoring 90 points
ESP swimmers comprising members from Aquatic Academy and Debbie McGee Swim School, recently competed at the SSA Level 2 Regional Championships at Ellis Park.
SSA set qualifying times at the start of the new season that swimmers needed to work towards.
61 teams gathered from as far afield as Tanzania, Namibia and Zimbabwe. Surprising to many, ESP’s small team of 12 swimmers managed to secure a 12th place.
Unfortunately ESP Kempton Park was not able to enter relays, probably losing points. Due to an early Easter many families had booked holidays and their swimmers were unavailable.
The ESP superstar at this gala was Kyle McKenzie, who won four gold and one bronze medal. He qualified for 11 finals, scoring 90 points.
Second place on the scoreboard went to Colette Fourie with 31 points and one gold medal, followed by Murray Copeland with 28 points.
Other finalists included Caitlin Stott (20 points and one bronze medal), Jonathan Smith (20 points), Ashleigh Stock (14 points) and Keara Bothma (11 points).
Nicholas Smith with one bronze medal scored nine points. Clayton Malaza three and Bernalee Doster one point. Storm Ryder and Caitlin Ashford swam well and strongly supported the ESP team. ESP swimmers qualified for 39 finals.
Kyle claimed two level three times in the 100m breaststroke (1:13.16), 200m breaststroke (2:38.19) and 200m individual medley (2:22.31).
Level 1 Regional Championships
Over 700 swimmers from 70 clubs around Southern Africa qualified to compete at the recent Level 1 Regional Championships at the Delville Swimming Pool in Germiston.
Unfortunately, due to school and public holidays, many swimmers were away, so ESP was represented by a small group of eight swimmers. This little group managed to achieve a 23rd place out of the 70 clubs that took part in the championship. No relay teams were entered.
Kerri-Lyn Claase won one silver and one bronze medal and was the highest scorer for ESP with 36 points. She was followed by Kerrin Burgess (35 points), who won one gold and one silver medal. Ciaran Le Goff won a silver medal (31 points), while Arno Joubert scored 20 points and both Nadine Vorster and Arno Vorster scored three points each. Kerri-Lyn and Kerrin both swam the level two times they will need to maintain in order to move to level two.
Swimmers qualified for 26 finals. Adrian Ristow and Danika Brechenmacher both swam their best times in the events they qualified to swim in.
