Day 2 – Session 4 Finals
“More JPP Games’ records fall on Night 2 of 2018 Junior Pan Pacs”
Team USA continued to dominate the Damodar Aquatic Centre pool, showcasing their fast junior swimmers by earning 12 medals. Out of the 8 contested finals they (Team USA) won 7, and also secured themselves 4 meet records.
Individual meet records and gold medals were claimed by Gretchen Walsh in the women’s 100m freestyle in 54.47 and Emily Weiss in the women’s 100m breaststroke with a time of 1:07.55.
Also earning gold on Friday were Drew Kibler in the men’s 100m free, Emma Weyant in the women’s 400m individual medley and Carson Foster in the men’s 400m IM. The United States also swept the 800m freestyle relays meet-record fashion.
Canada’s Gabe Mastromatteo was one to look out for during last night’s mixed medley relay, after his successful swim in the 100m breaststroke, where he won a Gold. The 16-year-old swam a marvelous 1:01.27, just fractions of a second in front of American Daniel Roy (1:01.85)
Japan’s Yamato Fukasawa took bronze in 1:02.60, beating out his countryman Kaede Hirakawa (1:02.80) and American Tim Connery (1:02.83).
Thomas Watkins was the standout performer on day 2 for team New Zealand. In the morning heats, Watkins slashed his 400m individual medley (IM) personal best by 4.42s to finish in 4:29.64, enough to see him through to the A-final. Watkins set his previous personal best (4:34.22) at the Aon NZ Opens last month and has had a solid build up to this meet and felt he could’ve gone faster.
Fiji’s Thomas Liebregts and Samuel Yalimaiwai, bettered their prelims performance when they both clocked personal bests in the finals of the men’s 100m breastroke B final.
Day 3 – Session 5 Prelims
“Team Fiji goes up against World Powerhouse Nations in Swimming at the 2018 Junior Pan Pacs”
USA’s Isabel Stadden swam herself and her team into setting a proud meet record with a time of
2:08.81. This was set during the prelims of the women’s 200m backstroke, breaking the Junior Pan Pacs Game’s record of 2:09.59. Stadden looks in top form to better her time, come the finals this evening.
Also, not far off the meet record is Peter Larson of the USA in the men’s 200m backstoke. Coming into these championships, Peter enters with a seed time of 2:00.24 and comfortably swam through the prelims in a time of 1:59.35, just 0.02.15s off of the meet record.
Australia’s Lani Pallister (4:12.69) seeded first going into the finals of the women’s 400m freestyle after edging out Miyu Namba of Japan who swam a personal best of 4:12.99.
Headlining Fiji this morning was Temafa Yalimaiwai. He swam a brilliant race in the men’s 100m butterfly prelims. Temafa previously had a personal best of 58.17 and bettered that by 0.43s to break the Fiji Open National record and secure himself a place in the B finals, this evening.
Fiji Swimming will be looking to verify that record as the competition progresses, but we are very proud and impressed with the swimmers’ efforts. Fiji Swimmers have managed to set a total of 15 personal bests in session 5 alone. With 3 more sessions to go, hopes are set high to improve these stats. Of the 15 PBS set, Tolu Young’s performance in the men’s 400m freestyle this morning was most impressive.
13 year-old Tolu Young is a great reflection of the development programme in the Fiji Swimming Federation. Only 2 years into taking up competitive Swimming, Young continues to perform consistently in the National Grand Prix (GP) circuit, and after setting PBs as recent as Aug 11 at GP2, he today slashed 24s off of his previous personal best.
Fiji’s personal bests:
- Calum Lobendahn – 4:41.94 Men’s 400m freestyle (2s PB)
- Tolu Young – 5:05.83 Men’s 400m freestyle (24s PB)
- Katarina Bobi – 1:14.67 Women’s 100m butterly (2s PB)
- Joan McGowan – 1:16.18 Women’s 100m butterly (4s PB)
- Temafa Yalimaiwai – 57.74 Men’s 100m butterfly (0.43s PB, New Open National record; the old record was 58.61 that was held by Epeli Rabua)
- Damien Kitione – 1:04.20 Men’s 100m butterfly (0.57s PB)
- Hansel McCaig – 1:04.75 Men’s 100m butterfly (1.25s PB)
- Faktaufon – 1:12.33 Men’s 100m butterfly (1.60s PB)
- Kunatuba – 2:45.05 Women’s 200m backstroke (0.73s PB)
- Esther Gonerogo – 2:55.07 Women’s 200m backstroke (11s PB)
- Samuel Yalimaiwai – 2:33.84 Men’s 200m backstroke (4s PB)
- Maivusaroko – 2:34.27 Men’s 200m backstroke (5s PB)
- Jayzon Requina – 2:34.68 Men’s 200m backstroke (6s PB)
- Edward Vakatalai – 2:37.44 Men’s 200m backstroke (0.67s PB)
- Musashi Tada – 2:39.75 Men’s 200m backstroke (6.04s PB)
Click here for official results.
We invite the General Public to come out in numbers tonight for the finals and for the last day of competition tomorrow (Sunday, Aug 26). Ticket are $2 per session and Heats are from 9am – 10.30am and Finals commencing from 5pm – 7pm.
Story by: Fiji Swimming (25/08/2018)