The new swimming cycle for 2016-17, with the usual series of time-trial meets, kicked off at Tal-Qroqq earlier this month.
These so-called ‘progress meets’ did generate some sort of momentum in recent years, resulting in several age-group records and lifetime bests in a number of races, with national records also featuring, although not so often.
As is to be expected, the swimmers’ performances in these initial local meets reflect the early season levels, with mundane clockings at best or below par ones at worst being the order of the day.
National coach Artem Goncha-renko is well aware that next year our top swimmers’ main target will be the biennial GSSE, this time in San Marino. The main objectives of these elite performers as they compete in local and overseas meets are geared towards reaching a peak early in June.
There are other regional and global events in the frame starting with the Manchester international meeting held last weekend where six national short-course records were broken. This is to be followed by more meets during 2017.
This, of course, pre-supposes a heavy workload for the swimmers primarily aimed at obtaining the minimum qualifying standard (MQS) before they can get the ticket to San Marino.
These targets are based on the third-place time of each race registered in the previous GSSE which, given the progress of the swimmers in countries like Iceland, Luxembourg and Liechtenstein, collective winners in the 2015 GSSE of 77 out of the 93 available medals, constitute a hard nut for our swimmers who won five medals in all.
The 2017 MQS schedule shows how far away our best performers are from reaching the required levels in many of the events despite the progress they have been credited with in recent years.
The exceptions are the shorter freestyle events where Andrew Chetcuti, Matthew Zammit and Matthew Galea have managed to obtain very decent clockings in the 50, 100 and 200-metre races.
In other events, Michael Umnov posted good swims while in some relays our aspirations are limited to no more than being competitive.
Beyond this, the targets are practically prohibitive and it is futile to enter swimmers in a competition tailored-made for our small country even if for argument’s sake the Maltese manage to qualify for the finals in some races.
The priority is obtaining a place on the podium while performing at one’s best levels even if that does not necessarily imply breaking national records or bettering personal limits every time.
Our limitations lie in the fact that once the younger category swimmers reach their best and go on to set up junior records, many of them simply fizzle out just when they reach the senior ranks.
There are many reasons for this lack of persistence, not least the higher physical demands and the innate drop in interest due to studies and other pursuits.
This is mostly evident in middle- and long-distance events where the results have been poor compared to those in shorter races.
Why is it that our swimmers are unable to withstand stamina-sapping conditions prevalent in longer races?
Specialised personnel conversant with psycho-physical factors of preparation can provide detailed answers to this question.
While acknowledging that facilities can be improved upon and we can do with more specialised coaches, the fact that the number of participants is also at a premium due to our limited culture in this sport cannot be dismissed.
This swimming background in Malta is not yet firmly ingrained as it is in waterpolo where we rank relatively high in the continental standings.
Unless there is a thorough soul-searching exercise to overcome this problem on all fronts we are, unfortunately, likely to retain the tag of a cinderella nation in swimming.
Short course times
At least, this bitter pill had a sugary coating when our swimmers set six new national records in the 25-metre pool in Manchester last weekend.
The new marks were obtained by Matthew Zammit – 22.26 and 49.89 seconds in the 50 and 100 freestyle, Thomas Wareing – 2:12.56 and 4:40.02 in the 200 and 400 individual medley races, Matthew Galea – 1:53.01 in the 200 freestyle, and Charis Cecarelli – 1:05.87 in the 100 butterfly.