Malta’s top sprinters provided the highlights of the 2016 ASA National Championships, held recently at the National Pool.
Keen competition from swimmers representing six clubs, the Special Olympics and the ASA Para Swimming teams offered constant excitement to the spectators.
Neptunes, Sirens and Sliema were in the forefront followed by ISC and SW Elite as their swimmers battled for supremacy. There were also numerous youngsters who posted personal bests besides breaking age-group records.
Pride of place goes to Matthew Zammit and Andrew Chetcuti who between them bettered three national freestyle records in the 50, 100 and 200m.
The best technical achievement was that of Chetcuti who dipped under 51 seconds in the 100 freestyle when covering the distance in 50.95 seconds to better his previous national mark by 0.21 seconds set in January and score 780 points on the FINA calculator.
This was 50 points more than his record of 1:53.30 set on Day One of the meet in the four-lap event.
Both his times are within the GSSE Minimum Qualifying Standards.
“I was super happy to go under 51 seconds in the 100 free and my 1:53.30 in the 200 was also a great result especially as I am in the middle of training and haven’t begun my rest yet,” Chetcuti said.
“My goals now are for Rio and to improve on these times which hopefully I can do as training seems to be working.”
The next best technical feat was that of Zammit whose national record of 22.82 seconds in the 50 freestyle scored 769 points. This time erased Chetcuti’s mark of 23.04 and is also inside the MQS for the Small Nations next year.
In the junior categories two swimmers who caught the eye with new Group ‘D’ records were Thomas Wareing and Francesca Falzon Young.
Wareing improved the 200 back and 200 IM marks when registering 2:13.37 and 2:15.17, respectively, while Falzon Young swam the 100 and 200 freestyle in 58.90 and 2:09.74, the last being 0.30 seconds off the national mark.
In the ‘A’ category, Mayley Pawley Neame broke the 50 breaststroke record when stopping the watches on 43.27.
These new junior limits complemented those of Andria Friggieri, 2:31.91 in the 200 back, and Leah Tanti, 1:16.93 in the 100 breaststroke, both set a week earlier in the Mediterranean Cup held in Malta.
Other notable performances came mostly from Michael Umnov in the 200 breaststroke and 200 IM, and the evergreen Nicola Muscat in the 50 freestyle.
The time of 7:46.50 in the 4x200 freestyle relay (inside the MQS of 7:51.22) would have shattered the five-year-old national record by 14.05 seconds but for the presence in the quartet of non-Maltese national Umnov.
One could not but notice that while the number of youngsters at the National Championships was encouraging, the downside of this end-of-season meeting could not be ignored as records in the longer races have again remained static.
This underlines the impression that our swimmers are falling short of endurance training.