Records tumble at meet - August 2015

SPEEDSTER: WHS student Elena Forlong is fourth fastest in the country in the 100m butterfly.

Age-group and regional records tumbled when the Subway Wanganui Swim team competed at the first major competition to be held at the Sir Owen Glen National Aquatic Centre on Auckland's North Shore last week.

Wanganui swimmers won two gold and two bronze medals, had 13 other top-10 finishes, including three in open finals, broke two Wellington regional age-group records and a host of Wanganui age-group and open records at the National Short Course Championship meet.

New Zealand age-group representative Elena Forlong had to wait until the final two days of competition to race her preferred butterfly events.

"She had some tough competition in the 100m butterfly event being touched out by 0.13 of a second for a fourth place finish in a Wanganui open and age-group record time of 1m 4.85s," McLay said.

"She then lowered this time to 1m 4.48s in the 15 to 16-year-old grading final in the evening session beating two of the three girls who had kept her off the victory dais earlier that day."

The Wanganui records were again not safe in the 16-year-olds' 200m butterfly with a bronze medal swim and a time of 2m 20.88s which was also good enough to qualify her for the open final that evening.

Saving her best for last, Forlong again swam a personal best time of 2m 20.63s to place her as the fourth-fastest woman in the event in New Zealand at the championships. Forlong's other swims of note were a Wanganui age group and open record in the 50m butterfly and an eighth placing in the 400m individual medley.

McLay said it was satisfying that training programmes were proving Wanganui swimmers could compete at this level.