The swimming competition at the Estevan 2016 Saskatchewan Summer Games didn’t feature a medal haul for the participating Golden Eels athletes with Team South East, but it did showcase a group of kids continually pushing themselves to reach their personal best.
“I couldn’t be happier,” said Hannah Mantei, 14, who earned a bronze medal in the 200-metre female breaststroke race and in the 4x100m female freestyle relay with Taeghan Hack, Bryn Lamontagne and Adah DeLeeuw. “I got personal bests in all my races and actually just the one race I did today (the 400m freestyle on Saturday) I took off 16 seconds from the beginning of the month.”
Josh Wilson, 13, earned a bronze medal in the 4x100m male medley relay with Aden Dickinson, Tre Thompson and Carson Wheeler, the 50m male butterfly race and the 4x50m male freestyle relay with Aden, Tre and Levi Cooley. In addition to winning a medal in the 50m butterfly event, Josh also broke the Saskatchewan record time for the race by .01 seconds.
“One hundredth of a second, so really close,” said Josh, noting another swimmer then beat his time to capture the record. “It’s a big accomplishment because I’m a summer swimmer and there are a lot of winter swimmers here and they swim all year round and I just swim for two months.”
Adah, 13, said the competition at the Summer Games was very tough and she is proud of taking home a bronze medal for the 4x100m female freestyle relay. She said the challenge of facing winter swimmers at this competition was part of its attraction.
“It’s just really fun,” said Adah, “but it’s also really nerve-wracking and it takes a lot of effort.”
Akeela Jundt, head coach of Team South East, said there wasn’t any extra training ordered for their swimmers before the Games due to their incredibly busy schedules with their own home clubs leading up to the competition. She said these kids practise Monday to Friday and swim in meets on the weekend during their season and each and every one of them was ready to go when the Games began.
“I’m happy with that and I’m happy with the attitude they brought to the Games because they were such a positive team,” said Jundt. “They were the best to work with and they were so happy just to be here. It was really cool.”
Taeghan, 14, said the chance to compete in front of big crowds of cheering supporters at their home pool also made the experience of participating in these Games something to remember. She said that was an added benefit to the opportunity of facing more seasoned swimmers in competition.
“It’s different,” said Taeghan. “They’re good, but going against them and realizing that you’re faster than them is just a good feeling.”
