Continuity and broader base is key

Typical bright spring weather kept the spirits of a host of foreign swimmers high as they converged on the National Swimming Complex, Tal-Qroqq, to take part in the 10th International Age Group Swimming Meeting between Friday and yesterday, in what has become an established event on the European swimming calendar.

The 400-odd participants, including a good number of Maltese, hailed from England, Italy, Ireland, Finland and Luxembourg. They made up for over 1,600 entries in the various age-groups, with the standard of the swimmers being finely tuned with that of our own.

The event this year also served to mark a significant signpost along the path of our top swimmers towards the Games of the Small States of Europe (GSSE), to be held in Malta, in the first week of June. The results obtained by the Maltese indicated that the swimmers are in the right groove prior to the last four-week preparatory phase leading up to the Games.

In fact, the times recorded by top prospect for a GSSE medal, Angela Galea, in the 100 and 200 metres butterfly races, 1:05.37 and 2:24.33 respectively, show that Galea is in trim and, hopefully, she should taper for the Games.

Very encouraging performances came from Roberta Callus whose dedication is helping her maintain the good standards she rediscovered in recent years. In her last race yesterday she was only four hundredths of a second outside Gail Rizzo's record of 2:13.45 in the 200 metres freestyle when helping the Malta team set up a new record of 9:16.58 in the 4 x 200 metres freestyle relay. The team was also composed of her sister Lara, Angela Galea and Davina Mangion.

On Friday the 22-year-old girl swam the 400 metres free in 4:40.84, only 0.75 seconds slower than her own national record. Her personal best in the 50 free is also indicative of her progress all-round.

The same applies to 16-year-old Neil Agius who was only just shy of his recently-set 800 metres record and a few metres down on his national 1,500-metre mark.

Nicky Abela was also in fine shape, establishing personal bests in the 100 and 200 metres breaststroke. She clocked 1:23.56 in the shorter and 2:53.00 in the longer race.

Impressive breakthrough

The impressive breakthrough made during the past year by the Neptunes swimmer, 14-year-old Kyle Scerri, under the guidance of coach Gail Rizzo, was kept up in this annual Easter-time event. On Friday, Scerri smashed the 1996 100m butterfly age-group record (Group C), held by Kenny D'Ugo, by a massive 2.23 seconds when he stopped the watches on 1:03.72. Yesterday, he also clipped 0.32 seconds off his own 50-metre 'fly Age-Group mark when he registered 29.02 seconds. His 1:00.49 in the 100 freestyle was a PB as was his 100 metres backstroke.

Another swimmer to erase a category record was Davina Mangion. She swam the 100-metre butterfly in 1:08.34, an improvement of 0.27 seconds on her own previous Group D best, established last month. The Sirens girl also did a PB in the 200 metres freestyle when clocking 2:19.15.

These performances were backed by a spate of PB's in the younger categories.

Commenting on the overall showings of his squad, national coach Attila Selmeci said he hopes the swimmers will show up well when the crunch comes in the June Games. Considering we still have three weeks of speed and endurance preparation, plus a tapering period, I think the swimmers did as well as expected, perhaps even better.

Dr Michael Gialanze, ASA vice-president and chairman of the swimming board said he hoped the momentum in swimming interest, which was regenerated in 1999, would continue.

The base which is being procured must not be lost. We are all working hard to promote this sport further. We want new names to crop up. There are Kyle Scerri and Davina Mangion who are knocking on the door of representative credentials. Their improvement indicates that they deserve to be drafted into the Malta squad for the forthcoming Games. If anything, that would give them encouragement and experience for future GSSE. This is what other countries within the Small States fold do.

Continuity and a broader base are key factors as we strive to maintain interest in swimming. The elevation of Sport to a Ministry should, hopefully, induce the authorities to go a step further through the building of a much-needed shallow 25-metre pool. The new indoor facility, which could be built adjacent to the diving pool at Tal-Qroqq, would help immensely towards attracting more siblings to the sport, Dr Gialanze said.