VICTORIA – The University of Victoria Vikes swimming teams had multiple podium performances at the Victoria hosted Canada West Swimming Championship, Nov. 24-26, but among the top performers was also a major award for fourt-year Vikes women's swimmer Taylor Snowden-Richardson. The Nanaimo, B.C. native was named the 2017 Canada West Student-Athlete Community Service Award winner following the final races of the conference championship.
VICTORIA – Danielle Hanus etched her name in the Canada West record books with an outstanding time of 59:09 in the 100-metre butterfly to capture both the gold medal and the conference record on day two of the Canada West Swimming Championships being hosted at the Saanich Commonwealth Pool.
VICTORIA – Four medals: one gold, one silver and two bronze were the result of an outstanding day of racing from the University of Victoria Vikes swimming teams after Day 1 of the Canada West Championships on Nov. 24 hosted in Victoria at Commonweatlh Pool.
All six PCS swimmers who were selected and participated over the weekend at the SBC Prospects camp showed a lot of speed and mental fortitude pushing hard at the four workouts. All were PB's or just over in the Dive 100 and competed tough in the sets, leading lanes on long days... Oh, and asked lots of good (and some entertaining..) questions in the classroom sessions. Well done all. (Keir Ogilvie, Anthony Gutierrez, Artem Kuklev, Jacob Rambo, Sophie Lorette and Naeva Scott-Bouris). Thanks to the coaches who gave up their weekend as well to support the camp.
For our last session of the weekend, we started bright and early with the 200m freestyle event. Bridget Rupert started our 10&unders off well, with a solid finish in 2nd place with a time of 2:43.55 dropping almost 11 seconds off her personal best. In 4th place, Lucy Hallett dropped 7 seconds off her best time touching in a time of 2:55.46. For the 11-12 age group category, in 2nd place Naeva Scott Bouris fnished with a time of 2:22.14 dropping almost 8 seconds from her personal best, Maia Denis touched closely behind in 3rd with a time of 2:22.86.
The swimmers came in to finals in Nanaimo smoking hot after a very successful morning. We started off the night with the 100m butterfly race with our 10 and under superstar Bridget Rupert touching in 2nd with a best time by 13 seconds, and in 3rd we had Imogen Hawes who dropped 5 seconds. In the 11-12 age category we had Maia Denis touching in 2nd with a time of 1:17.03 and Nolan Crisp in 3rd with a time of 1:19.16.
PCS brought the heat to Nanaimo on the first day of competition with 91 swimmers in the meet. The team travelled up early Saturday morning to get into a busy warm-up and the prelims starting at 9:00 a.m. The last month and a half of hard training really showed with the swimmers. The session started of with a bang with 100m Freestyle as the first event. In the 10&Under, Bridget Rupert was the top performer at the meet with a 1:11.12, dropping 7.5 seconds and besting the top boy by 5 seconds.
The Vikes landed 8 swimmers on the Honour Roll for last year's efforts. Congratulations to the following swimmers: Jeremy Lynn, Baylee Munro, Josh Zakala, Buzz Mallender, Bryce Molder, Juliana Bartemucci, Vicky Mock, and Taylor Snowden-Richardson!
A swimmer from Nanaimo is building a team intended to strengthen and support sick children.
Taylor Snowden had a family friend who was diagnosed with leukemia and wanted to let him know she was thinking about him. She crocheted a knit hat based on the Disney movie The Incredibles, and has continued creating the caps as part of a community project, she’s calling Tay’s Team.
