Swimming Activities – February/March 2013

St. Vincent and the Grenadines Amateur Swimming Association
P.O. Box 600, St. Vincent, West Indies
Email: svgasa@gmail.com

February 19th, 2013

PRESS RELEASE

Re: Swimming Activities – February/March This Month in Swimming

The St Vincent and the Grenadines Amateur Swimming Association (SVGASA) in partnership with the Bank of Nova Scotia are pleased to present an update on recently completed activities and upcoming activities.

1. Barbados Long Course National Swimming Championships (BASA-LC)
The Barbados Long Course (LC) National Championships was held at the Aquatic Centre’s 50 meter pool in Wildey, Barbados from February 12th to 17th, 2013. A total of nine swimmers from St Vincent (ranging in age from nine to fourteen) represented St. Vincent and their local swim club, Black Sands Swim Squad. Kyle Dougan, one of the coaches of Black Sands was the coach to the travelling squad. This event is an official World Championship qualifying event for the upcoming World Championships to be hosted in Barcelona Spain from July 19th to August 4th, 2013. The Barbados National Championships also attracted swimmers from St, Lucia and Grenada as well as Barbados and St. Vincent. The competition is at a very high standard and it is seen as a great testing and preparation event for the Caribbean Championships (CARIFTA). Our Vincentian swimmers did very well and most of them set personal best times. In particular, both Shne Joachim and Nikolas Sylvester did very well.
 Shne Joachim (in the age category 11-12) category won a Gold medal in the 50 Meter Breaststroke, a Silver medal in the 100 Breaststroke and three Bronze medals in the 200 Meter Breaststroke, the 50 Meter Butterfly and the 50 Meter Freestyle events.
 Nikolas Sylvester (in the age category 11-12) won a three Silver medals in the 50 Meter, 100 Meter and 200 Meter Breaststroke events. He also won a Bronze medal in the 50 Meter Freestyle and narrowly missed a bronze medal in the 100 Meter Freestyle events.

2. The Scotiabank Invitational Swimming Championships (SISC)
The Scotiabank Invitational Swimming Championships will be held from February 22nd to 24th, 2013. This event will be held at the Shrewsbury Pool facility at Ratho Mill. It will be used as the final opportunity for Swimmers to qualify for the National team to compete at the XXVII CARIFTA Swimming Championships to be held in Jamaica from March 29th to April 3rd, 2013.
The Scotiabank Invitational Swimming Championships will feature races from 25 meters to 400 meters in age categories ranging from Eight (8) years old to Over Fifteen (15) years old. All events will be Timed Finals. The general public is invited and encouraged to come out and support the swimmers. Racing will start at 5.30pm on Friday, 10am on Saturday and 9.30am on Sunday. Food and drinks will be on sale.

3. CARIFTA Swimming Championships
The CARIFTA Swimming Championships will be held in Jamaica from March 29th to April 3rd, 2013.This is the top swimming event in the Caribbean and features the regions’ best swimmers between the ages of eleven and seventeen. More than twenty countries have been invited to participate. These championships are also usually well attended by scouts from US colleges and universities who are trying to identify the most talented swimmers. The USA’s college and university system produces the most swimmers that compete in the Olympics. CARIFTA provides an excellent opportunity for young swimmers to be identified with the aim of obtaining a university scholarship. It is important to note that the only track and field offers more scholarship opportunities than swimming. Thus swimming is not only a great lifelong healthy sport but also a potentially academically rewarding sport.
In 2012, we sent two swimmers to compete at CARIFTA. This year, the team representing St Vincent and the Grenadines will likely have between five and eight members (the final team will be selected by February 26th, 2013). Athletes who have already qualified (via their swim times) for CARIFTA to represent St Vincent and the Grenadines will include Nikolas Sylvester, Chavez Joseph, Shane Cadogan, Storm Halbich and Shne Joachim. We wish the team a successful CARIFTA Championships.

4. Grassroots Program
We hope to implement our Grassroots program in two communities in April. This program will involve a total of forty children (twenty from each community). The program will expose the children to formal swimming instruction and will include an educational element. The program will run for twelve weeks and then be rotated to another two communities. The program will also include at least two adults from each community who will be instructed in the basics of coaching to allow them to continue working in their communities after the formal end of the initial twelve week program.

5. The LIME Open Water Swimming Series (LIME-OWSS)
In partnership with our silver partner, LIME, we are planning our first Open Water Swim competition in early May. This competition will likely be held on Villa Beach and will be open to participation by the general public. We plan to hold events over one hundred meters, five hundred meters and one thousand meters. We will provide more details in the near future. Open Water Swimming is becoming a major part of swimming. It features in all major swimming Championships and the Olympic Games. The SVGASA believes that given our coastlines and beaches (combined with our extremely limited pool facility) Open Water Swimming (OWS) can be a major competitive advantage for St Vincent and the Grenadines. We intend to work with the Tourism Authority in actively promoting our Open Water Swimming Series. We are very pleased that our major telecoms provider, LIME, has agreed to partner with us in this event.

6. Schools Program
The SVGASA has resumed its Schools Program and there are now four schools (including a primary school) that are involved. Given our limited capacity at the pool we urge any other interested schools to contact us very quickly.

Please contact us at svgasa@gmail.com with any queries, comments or suggestions you may have in regard to swimming.