Rotorua swimmers pick up impressive haul at National Age Group Swimming Championships

Swim Rotorua team. Photo/Supplied

Swim Rotorua rounded off another successful campaign at the National Age Group Swimming Championships held in Wellington.

The team of 12 swimmers returned to Rotorua with a haul of two silver and six bronze medals from the event at Kilbirnie Pool last week.

Bianca Donelley, 14, was kept busy competing in five individual finals.

She renewed her rivalry with freestyle specialist Paris Culter, from Manawatu, battling hard to take home three medals. Her best place came in the 50m freestyle, taking the silver medal in 27.43 seconds. Bianca won her bronze medals in the 200m and 400m freestyle with respective times of 2m 10.71s and 4m 36.06s.

She also led the AquaKnights Zonal team to victory in the 4 x 200m freestyle relay.

Josh Balmer produced a stunning debut to grab the silver medal in the boys 13 years 400m freestyle. He finished strongly in a time of 4m 33.74s, an impressive improvement of 11 seconds on his entry time.

Josh enjoyed a successful week of racing to make further finals in the 200m freestyle and 200 medley.

Milla Theobald flew high in her butterfly events to make three finals. She dug deep in the last lap of the gruelling 200m butterfly to snatch the bronze medal and a personal best time of 2m 30.10s. Her other butterfly finals produced a very swift 31.03 seconds in the 50m one lap race, and a time of 1m 07.96s in the 100m event. Milla's tenacity paid off, the swimmer picking up another bronze medal in the 800m freestyle with a time of 9m 34.24s.

David Boles demonstrated great form and resilience, thwarting his rivals to win the bronze medal in his 16 years age group in the 400m medley, and claiming a personal best time of 4m 47.85s.

He also made finals in the 100m and 200m backstroke and 200m medley.

Paddy Baylis made several finals across three different strokes. His best result came in the boys 17-18 years 1500m freestyle where he placed third with a season best time of 16m 33.62s.

Making finals and picking up valuable team points were Annelyse Cowie, 13, in the 200m breaststroke, Emily Spear, 13, in the 400m and 800m freestyle, James Baldwin, 15, in the 50m freestyle and Joe Nagera, 16, in the 50m backstroke.

In the club relays, the quartet of Bianca, Skye Cox, Kapua Warbrick and Milla gave it everything to come 10th in the 4 x 100m freestyle. Bianca, Skye and Milla then combined with Annelyse to pick up 8th spot in the 4 x 100m medley relay.

Head coach Alastair Johnson was pleased with the team's efforts.

"We have enjoyed a very good week. Our goal was to break into the top 10 teams, and were just outside that with a national placing of 14th. We are still a young team and I am very confident that we will come back next year with a bigger and faster team to crack that top 10 place."