Evans Wins Freestyle Double at Qld State Champs
WAIS swimming star Blair Evans claimed two gold medals to head up a strong WA contingent at the Queensland Sate Swimming Championships this week.
Evans performed a world top 10 ranking swim in the 800 freestyle on the last night of competition to add a second gold to her collection, following on from the 400m freestyle success earlier in the week.
The WAIS squad will now head home to compete in the WA State Championships from 18-22 December at Challenge Stadium Pool.
WAIS Swimming Performance Manager Greg Hodge claimed Evans results were even more impressive given they came in the midst of a heavy training set.
“Still in heavy preparation Blair’s time of 8.27.13 is only 1.3 seconds outside the 21 year old Australian record held by Michelle Ford from 1978 and was two seconds faster than her personal best set at the World Trials in March this year,” he said.
Evans also set a new personal best in the 200m freestyle [1.58.71] and 400m freestyle of 4.07.06. Both swims saw even paced races with negative splits.
New WAIS scholarship holder, 13 year old Brianna Throssell confirmed her outstanding talent with four WA All-time records and overall outstanding performances in the 50m freestyle (26.88-Open event), 100m butterfly [WA record 1.05.03], 200m freestyle [WA record silver 2.03.72], 400m freestyle [WA record silver 4.22.59], 200m backstroke [bronze 2.23.31] and 400m IM [WA record 4.59. in the Open which would have won gold in the under 14 age group].
WAIS athlete Travis Nederpelt returned to the competitive arena for the first time since the Beijing Olympics in his quest to return to the world stage and his third Olympics in London 2012, with competitive performances in the 10om and 200m butterfly.
Ayrton Dickey confirmed his status as a rising star of WA swimming in the 100m backstroke with a personal best of 2.02.30 to rank him in the top five in Australia.
Open water World Championships swimmer Rhys Mainstone swam a personal best 1500m pool time of 15.51.26mins for fifth place.
Greg Hodge said “All athletes attending have come away with national age or open qualifying times and five athletes are within a percent of achieving the WAIS selection standards for scholarships in 2010. With all of these athletes 16 years and under it augurs well for the future of swimming in WA.”
Other noteworthy WA swims included:
City of Perth athletes: Hamish Rose [19 yrs} silver in the Open 50m freestyle [outstanding time of 22.91ranks him 3rd WA all time], Brielle Jarrett [16 yrs] with a six second personal best of 2.35.26 [bronze], Cooper Rogers [16yrs] fourth place in 100m and 200m backstroke both in personal best times, Gene Williams [16 yrs] a 25 second personal best in the 1500m Open [ranked him the first 16yr old]
Arena Joondalup athletes: Kacey O’Connell [16 yrs] [fourth place in 100m fly in a personal best time of 1.03.04] and Gianna Leone [18 yrs] personal best time of 1.02.86 in the 100m fly.