On Wednesday 11th September, our team of 5 Columba College girls, made up of Molly Woodham, Ashlea Law, Molly Law, Jordan Summers and Gabby White packed up our bags and made our way to Hamilton.

I had the privilege of leading the Columba swimming team into our 4 days of racing at the New Zealand Secondary Schools Swimming Championships. As we had traveled up the night before racing started, we were able to go get a feel for the pool and the environment we would be racing in by going for a warm-up the next morning. We were all rearing to go after this warm-up session and were feeling excited to compete against all the other schools attending the Championships. The event had over 700 competitors all coming together to represent their schools, which meant we had to be prepared for packed warm-ups and long sessions! 

The first session of racing consisted of two relay races for the team with the 4x50m medley relay followed by the 4x100m freestyle relay. We managed to gain a 4th in our 4x50m medley relay with the team of Jordan on backstroke, Molly W on breaststroke, Gabby on butterfly and Molly L backing up the relay with the final freestyle leg. We were super stoked with this result and it was only the start of a great night of racing as later on, the girls managed to claim the bronze medal in 4x100m freestyle relay. The team consisted of Jordan, Ashlea, Molly W and Molly L. This placing was well deserved with all four of the girls swimming excellent splits.  

Over the next three days of individual racing we saw a total of 24 Personal Best times swam, many top 8 placings, Otago records broken by Molly Law within the 17 year old age group, and Jordan smashing out a 200m butterfly personal best time to claim the gold medal for the 16 year old age group. Molly Law gained three silvers and a bronze within her races of 100m freestyle, 50m freestyle, 50m butterfly, and 100m individual medley. Jordan also gained a bronze medal in the 100m breaststroke.  

When all our points were combined, we ranked 4th within the Girls Schools, with only 5 swimmers. I was so proud of the way all of the girls represented the school with pride and what we managed to achieve over these four days.

Gabby White - Swimming Captain