Swimmers make a splash in Granite City
Lochaber Swim team ended the season on a high at the recent North District Age Group Championship at Aberdeen Aquatics Centre from March 25 to March 27.
Calum Stewart, aged 13, was the star of the show bringing back four individual gold medals – 50m and 100m freestyle and 50m butterfly and breastroke – as well as three silver medals in the 100m breaststroke and the 100m and 50m backstroke.
Calum’s spectacular achievement saw the first individual gold for Lochaber swimmers in 22 years.
Andzelina Gerasimuka, 13, also secured a medal, coming home third in the 200m butterfly.
Competing in a 50-metre pool for the first time and in her first 800m race, Charleigh Adams produced a personal best (PB) time, finishing sixth in the 14/15 age group for north swimmers.
With the Midlands Championships also taking place, swimmers from both regions also swam against each other with Charleigh the 10th fastest swimmer overall.
Charleigh finished seventh in the 200m breaststroke, Mya MacCallum made her first final in the 50m backcrawl where she finished in sixth place while Yasmin MacCallum achieved PBs in all her swims.
There were more PBs from Yasmin and Charleigh on day two, while Andzelina finished 11th in the 400 Individual Medley.
Charleigh made it into her first North District final and finished in sixth place in the 100m breastroke final.
Although Mya and Andzelina both qualified as eighth and ninth fastest north swimmers in the 100m breaststroke, they ended up 11th - first reserve and 13th due to the inclusion of the Midlands District swimmers at this event.
Yasmin achieved a top 15 spot in the 100m breaststroke.
Mya had a remarkable swim in her 50m backcrawl final. When given a faulty backcrawl wedge (technical term) she fought back to finish seventh north swimmer in her 60m backstroke final.
Charleigh was within a second of her personal best in the 100mt breaststroke final finishing eighth, only 0.07s short of a Scottish Championship entry time.
Mya had two more fantastic swims producing personal bests, but unfortunately although finishing eighth fastest north swimmer in both the 100m breaststroke and 100m back crawl, she only achieved a reserve slot in the final due to three swimmers from the Midlands having faster times.
Yasmin again moved up a number of places in the rankings in the 100m breaststroke and backcrawl and is now top 15 in both. Coach Stevie Martin said: ‘I am incredibly proud of the Lochaber team. This season we have won trophies and medals in competitions against much larger clubs from across the country.’