Homegrown talent vs the best of the rest - that's how the men's individual medley events are shaping up at this year's Greerton Winter swim meet which starts at Baywave tomorrow night.
Starting for the locals is Greerton swimmer Nathan Capp. Now training at the New Zealand High Performance Centre, Capp will be up against fellow HPC swimmer, 19-year-old Mitchell Donaldson from Auckland's North Shore.
Over the 400m IM Capp is ranked first and Donaldson second. Over 200m the rankings are reversed. Over 100m, Tongan speedster Amini Fonua is ranked 2/100ths of a second ahead of Donaldson and Capp.
However, in all the IM events the two favourites have to be wary of 16-year-old Bradlee Ashby. The Hamilton swimmer narrowly missed the great Danyon Loader's 400 IM New Zealand age group record while winning gold at the Australian championships last year and has recently been training in Queensland.
Capp also takes leading rankings into the longer 200m, 400m and 1500m freestyle events.
One of the highlights of the meet is the 'medley skins' event. This event takes the top 10-ranked swimmers on points after all the competition is finished and pits them against each other in a series of 50m sprints.
After each sprint the slowest swimmers are eliminated until only the two fastest are left to race off for the top prize, with $1500 on offer for podium placings.
To shake up the event further, the middle sprints will be butterfly, backstroke and breaststroke, meaning the top freestyle sprinter may well be eliminated before reaching the final race off.
Last year Capp was beaten in the Skins final by Steve Kent and will once again have his work cut out for him against some of the sprint specialists, including Fonua and 18-year-old freestyle specialist Daniel Gregory-Campbell.
Other individual stars in the men's events look likely to be Kurt Bassett and Shaun Burnett. Bassett, 22, was unlucky to miss Olympic selection in the 200m backstroke after finishing second at the Olympic trials to New Zealand representative Gareth Kean. Bassett has entered the 100m backstroke in Tauranga and if he swims anything near his 53.26 seed time then spectators will be in for a treat.
Burnett, 21, is the national 200m butterfly champion and has entered that event in Tauranga as well as the 50m and 100m 'fly.
Women's 2001 medley Skins finalists Samantha Richter and Laura Quilter are both returning. Although Richter, 22, might just have the speed edge over 50m, freestyle Quilter is a strong swimmer through the other disciplines and will be hoping to use that to her advantage.
Baywave will also be welcoming back 12-year-old Gabrielle Fa'amausili. Last year Fa'amausili broke the national age group record at this event in the 50m backstroke and will no doubt be hoping Mount Maunganui's Baywave water proves just as fast in 2012.
Local interest in the women's events will centre on 16-year-old Jessica Miller and Taylor Armstrong, 18, with the pair racing over 800m freestyle on the opening night, with Miller's outstanding 2011 time of 8m 59.10s the leading seed time for 2012.
Miller will also be taking her chance to race against some New Zealand's leading swimmers in other events, including Gisborne 18-year-old Britta Carol over 200m and 400m freestyle.
Armstrong is second seed behind Quilter over 100m backstroke and the No1 seed over 400m IM.
Being the biggest swim meet in Tauranga this year, most local age group swimmers are taking the chance to mix it up with the best swimmers in their age groups. With over 260 individual swimmers attending from all around the North Island competition will be fierce, with prizemoney also on offer for the top swimmers in each age group.