[clear - refresh] ---THE ETCH-A-SKETCH BLOG--- [created by may]


17/04/2004
i have never envisioned myself in swimming trunks parading around a swimming pool for an entire afternoon. but i did just that on friday, the day of the college swimming championships. because of the nature of my duties that afternoon, i had to move around and enter the water at will, from my few races, to the changing of lane ropes and facilitating the rubber float relay.

more details: 6 events. 3 medals. 3 individual events. 3 relays. i silver, 2 bronzes. no medals for individual events. came in 4th in the 50 breast, 35.70secs, 4th in the 100m breast,1 min 22.00secs, 6th in the 200m breast, 3 min 06 secs. my finishing let me down on the day. i started my races well, but my fitness told and i wasn't able to finish as strongly as the other competitors, and i missed out on the medals just like that. my finishing for the 50 was atrocious. i glided to the wall. in a normal mistake-free 50 sprint, u smash urself into the wall. u collide at high velocity w the wall. i failed to do that. as for teh 100 breast, my finish was slightly better, but not as satisfactory as i would have wished for. i lost steam towards the end, and lost my bronze medal as well. but i must say, the challenge is in swimming w the best. the field was strong, the school swimmers, the water polo players giving each other a good fight. the polo players donned their infamous pink trunks. having competed on friday, being there, tensed up and feeling butterflyery, i feel more confident now to face the race that matters, the nationals. before that, i still have the interconstituency swim competition to exorcise my 50m perfomance on friday. i can go below 35secs, and i'll work towards that. it'll be encouraging and awesome. frankly, what i need to build on is my fitness, to last the 2 and 4 laps that i will probably be swimming come july.

the relays were quite a surprise. in the interhouse relays, got a 2nd placing for medley and a third for the freestyle relay after one house dq. then, the inter-cca relay, i tot we had finished fourth but we were awarded a third. still, we were the only sport in the top three, w the other 2 winners being societies. it's nice to have gotten the three relay medals, and it also shows me how much more i'll have to work to improve before racing in the race tt matters in july. as of now actually, i'm not sure if i'm going to swim in the nationals.

well, the rubber float relay worked out very well indeed. the lifeguard corps had designed the relay, and we were to execute it, to facilitate and do all the briefing. well well, i had plenty of fun. after briefing all the swimmers involved, 4 from each house of each sex, there were still plenty of queries from the participants. for the nature of the event, haha, there were all sorts of pple invovled. the swimmers, the polo players, the normal swimmers.. haha, a very nice mix. one thing didn't work out though, they were supposed to sing a cheer during the race but many didn't carry that out. and i unexpectedly played commentator for a while as i had to describe the race to the audience. the reason y i felt a bit to 'open' was because, most pple were attired in sch uniform and i was one of the few who was prancing arnd in tt tiny bit of cloth. *rolls eyes*

a very big job by the lifeguards, a wonderful spirit of team cooperation and the level of involvement today was superb. the lifeguards did a great job, w time constraints, they rose to the occassion when it mattered. a very fantastic job by them. pulling in those lane ropes, ensuring they were properly rolled up, those messy wave breakers, laying the 25 metre lane ropes, removing them. we worked to clockwork precision. i'm proud to be a lifeguard!

i'm tired but very happy after a day of much fun. a bit saddened by my failure to secure those medals, but nothing's gonna put me down so easily.


cest la vie.

wizzing away on 5:12 PM

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