Stergiadis, Theron top swimmers

HELENI Stergiadis and Bernard Theron were the standout performers at the Bank Windhoek Long Course Gala 4 over the weekend.

The 16-year-old Stergiadis of Dolphins Swimming Club produced the best overall performance in terms of Fina points, while she also produced five of the top 10 performances of the gala.

Theron, also of Dolphins, produced four of the top ten performances, while Ronan Wantenaar of Namib Swim Academy was the only other swimmer to feature amongst the top ten.

Stergiadis’ best performance came in the women’s 200m freestyle where she gained 589 Fina points by winning the event in 2:14,76, which was more than two seconds off her season’s best time of 2:12:25.

Stergiadis also produced the third and fourth best performances in the 800m freestyle and the 200m individual medley with times of 9:43,60 (573 points) and 2:32,30 (567 points) respectively.

Theron produced the second best performance of the gala by winning the

50m butterfly in 26,94 for which he gained 577 points.

He also gained top ten rankings in the 100m butterfly (546 points), 50m freestyle (544), 50m backstroke (540).

Ronan Wantenaar of NSA produced the fifth best performance of the gala when he gained 563 Fina points for winning the men’s 17-18 50m breaststroke in 31,42 seconds. His time, too though, was well off his season’s best of 29,47.

There were no records at the gala, while several swimmers missed the event due to other school sporting activities.

A total of 130 swimmers from four swimming clubs entered the event. Dolphins had the most entries with 79 swimmers, and were followed by Aqua Swimming Club (29), NSA (12) and Marlins (nine).

It was the first gala of the year and also the last before Namibia hosts the Cana Zone 4 Swimming Championships in Windhoek next month.

Several masters swimmers also competed in preparation for the Cana Championships as well as the Masters World Championships in August.