A Word From Our Coaches - March 07, 2024

From The Coaches:

FUNdamentals 2 & 3

Fundamentals training groups have been learning about and working to build endurance! We are attempting to remember 5m underwater dolphin kick off each wall in a tight streamline. The coaches are very proud of the independence swimmers have gained at practice and swim meets. Great job to all swimmers who participated in the February swim meets!
Our standout swimmers of the month are Emily B. and Duncan C., both swimmers are very dedicated to technical improvements in butterfly and underwaters off every wall. They are strong role models for others in the group helping to clarify instructions for the sets and keeping everyone on track during dryland training!
Congratulations to Walter D. and Gyuri L. for graduating NovaTech Level 1 and moving on to Level 2 competition! 
~Coaches Christina and Karley
 

Blue

Blue has been stepping up their training in the past month, increasing the intensity of our workouts, as well as focusing on having fast turns with 5m of dolphin kicks off the walls. This led into some great racing at the NovaTech meet as well as AA champs last month. At the NovaTech meet both Abby J. and Molly M. graduated from Level 2 and moved on to Age Group competition! Abby joined 12 other Blue swimmers at AA champs the following weekend. At AA champs, Blue saw many best times get added to the Crusaders poster, as well as had a total of 9 finals swims! From our finals races, Bowen L. won a bronze medal in the 12&u 200 BR, while Kyrie A. won a bronze medal in the 12&u 50 BR.
I want to highlight Freddy L. this month as a standout swimmer. At AA Champs, he helped out teammates who were new to age group competition know when to head up for their races, as well as make sure they were in the right lane and remembered their heat! This was a huge help with so many swimmers learning the ropes of age group competition. He also stepped up and swam as an alternate in the 100 BK when a finals qualifier did not show for their race, finishing 5th in the event!
~ Coach Victoria 

Gold

Training update: The Gold practices have been preparing swimmers for the recent meets - focusing on technical aspects, endurance, and speed. Our IM sets have focused on building speed throughout stroke transitions, and our Monday practices have built up to 20 x 100m free on pacetimes specific to the swimmer. The effort for these challenging sets have been incredible! We look forward to getting updated skill check measures in practice and seeing improvements before the March training break.
AA champs: 10 gold swimmers competed at the AA winter champs in Wolfville. We had some very big achievements throughout the weekend with swimmers stepping up to swim many times in heats and finals. It was great to see swimmers supporting and cheering on their teammates, joining in activation together before events and learning a lot about their sport and their own skills. Gold swimmers brought home a collection of medals - 7 gold, 4 silver and 4 bronze with Nadav and Bryce placing 1st and 2nd as high point male swimmers in the 12 and under age group. Pippa and Nadav both achieved their AAA qualifying times (collecting more times along the way). 
AAA champs: The gold group was well represented at AAA champs at Dalplex on the weekend with 6 swimmers in attendance! This included Pippa and Nadav who had their first AAA long course experience the weekend after a great weekend at AA champs. For many of the AAA swimmers, this was their first long course prelims and finals meet - great job keeping energy high! With awesome relay swims, time drops in finals, and lots of cheering, Gold brought great energy to the meet. Shoutout to Lily Zwicker who brought home a gold medal for 800 Free and a bronze medal for 400 IM, and congratulations to Ainsley MacPherson who broke her own 50 fly LC club record by over 1 second that was recently set at the January meet!
Swimmer highlight: We would like to highlight Philippa F. for the effort and enthusiasm she has had especially throughout long swim meets! Pippa had two big weekends of racing back to back and kept her energy up, stepping up to race many times over and focusing on each race, shaking off any setbacks to bring her best each time, and still making sure she had plenty of energy for cheering and supporting her teammates. Pippa's focus and determination in practice is showing in those results at meets, go Pippa!
~Coaches Leila and Lauren

Junior

Junior squad showed very good follow-through in applying the work from practice sessions to their races at both the NS AA Winter Champs and the David Fry East Coast Champs.  And the results showed it with multiple best times and more than an hour revising our race pace training sheets!  There's going to be some fast practices as we head into the Spring semester of the swim season.  In addition to all the personal bests Brody MacPherson finished the DF ECC meet with three Club Records - twice breaking his own record in the 50 breaststroke for 13-14 boys and the 200 breaststroke in prelims.  This was a long held record by Kevin Dupuis who also happened to be Brody's coach when he joined the team in the Novatech (now Fundamentals) squad. 
~Coach Michelle

Senior

Senior squad has been training hard going into AA Champs and David Fry East Coast Champs with it culminating in strong racing from all our swimmers. The hard work was very evident in racing with our technique and pace work leading to some strong racing, especially in the 400Fr, 800Fr, and 1500Fr. Emma Mullet, Sam Somerton, and Sophia Croft represented the group well at AA champs all three had some great stand out swims. Emma with a great 1500, Sam with a strong 200Fly and Sophia with the 400IM. At David Fry East Coast Champs Alex Jonsen-Humble, Leon Bautista, Luke Ellis, and Idan Arie along with the Junior boys helped us to win the Male High Point Award and Alex won the 15 and over Men’s high point award as well! 
-Coach Mikayla