Swimming: BOP records smashed at Baywave

Greerton swimmer Louis Fitzjohn was one of the stars of the Greerton Winter Champs held at Baywave. Photo / George Novak

The appearance of nearly 30 of China's best young swimmers added an international touch of class to the annual three-day Greerton Winter Champs that finished at Baywave on Sunday.

The meet sponsored by Classic Builders and Pub Charity attracted a record number of 370 swimmers, up from 250 last year, including swimmers from throughout the North Island.

The Chinese contingent did not let the large crowd down with some seriously fast times.

Zi Xin Song, 12, broke the NZ age group record time for the girls' 100 breaststroke in 1:13.01. Bing Xi Cai, 13, swam faster than the NZ record for the 50m butterfly, touching in 27.13 seconds.

Tauranga clubs are producing some of the fastest young swimmers in New Zealand, and there was plenty of that talent on show at Baywave.

Greerton swimmer Louis Fitzjohn, 13, had remarkable eight second places and a third but his undoubted highlight was winning the 400m medley in 4:58.42. His time seriously threatened Olympian Kane Radford's BOP record, missing it by just 0.24 seconds.

Greerton's Lochlainn O'Connor, 16, won the 16 and over male award as top points scorer for the meet despite being in heavy training for the NZ champs in October. He won both the 200m medley, his speciality the 200m butterfly and collected five more top three placings.

But another young Tauranga butterfly swimmer Tristan Eiselen, 14, from Otumoetai caused quite a splash by knocking off three of O'Connor's BOP records for the 100 medley, 100m and 200m butterfly plus his own record in the 50m butterfly.

Eiselen's 50m and 100m butterfly times are now threatening NZ records.

Greerton's Travis Hudson, 14, dominated the breaststroke events in his age group. He won the 100m and 200m and placed second in the 50m, missing the BOP record by just 0.05 seconds.

Otumoetai swimmer Tarquin Magner, 14, impressed by winning the 13 and over male age group. Ruby Matthews, 18, also from Otumoetai continued her great form in 2017 by breaking two BOP records in the 400m freestyle (4:24.12) and 800m freestyle (9:01.42).

Papamoa's Zyleika Pratt-Smith, 13, also broke a BOP record in the 50m breaststroke (34.58) and continued to impress at major swim meets.

The Greerton Winter Champs ended with the hugely popular medley skins where the top 10 points scorers over three days swim off against each other in five heats leaving every two minutes.

Backstroke specialists Kane Follows (Mt Eden) and Zac Dell (Pukekohe) shut out freestyle sprint ace Dan Caldwell (St Peter's) in the men's skins with backstroke drawn as the final elimination race to their advantage.

Simone Lusby (United) was too strong for Vanessa Ouwehand (Te Awamutu) and Paige Flynn (St Peter's) in the women's skins.

The junior skins was won by Daniel Shanahan (Otumoetai) from Zhou Zi Jian (Shanghai) and Louis Fitzjohn (Greerton).

Mount Maunganui's Molly Shivnan made the podium in third behind Shanghai's Zi Xin Song and Yi Qiong Zhang in the girls' event.