Swimming:Tigers ready to forge ahead

Swimming:Tigers ready to forge ahead

Tigers have six of their young age groupers in attendance.

Kerrie Smith is the youngest at ten and Abigail Lucas, Pippa Whitehead and James Payne all 11 while Michael Le Couilliard and Sam Fernandes are in the 12s section.Rebecca Larkin and Jill van der Vliet, both 13, are in the toughest meet of their careers while 14-year-old Sarah-Jane Smith is hopeful of continuing her good season.Victoria Rebours should progress after good swims in France last month and Ian Blake, the only age-group boy, will be out to continue his form having raced well against excellent opposition at the Aldershot meet last month.The largest Tigers group is the 15-17-year-old girls.

Racing a full programme, Amy Pallot, Ashley Cope and Lauren Le Mière each made the Island Games team their 2003 target and all achieved their goals.

The trio are now targeting National qualifying times in 2004.Rosie Barrett is a regular National qualifier and she too will be hoping to improve her times and rankings; Barrett is also within three per cent of the Youth Games qualifying time.Damien Boucheré is the only senior able to travel and he should continue to improve his long course performances.Meanwhile Tigers swimmer Simon Le Couilliard left Jersey on Wednesday of last week and, after two days of travel back to Australia, he returned to the water on Monday, taking part in the Queensland State Championships.Under the circumstances he has swum well in the 16 years age group with the following times and positions, 200 metres butterfly in 2.07.88 (third); 200m backstroke, 2.12.2 (fourth); 100m butterfly 58.5 (sixth) and 400 IM 4.55.23 (fifth).Le Couilliard’s 200m back was closest to his best while the other swims were two per cent away.In the men’s event, the Tiger finished 22nd in the 50m back in a personal best time of 38.9 seconds while he was 48th in the 100m butterfly.Following the Open, Le Couilliard will now aim for the British trials early in April.

The Olympic team and the junior team for the Europeans will be selected at this meet.

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