New Zealand Secondary Schools Swimming Championships
From 28-30 July, 17 St Paul’s swimmers competed at the New Zealand Secondary Schools Swimming Championships at Waterworld achieving an incredible haul of national medals. The stunning results from the event were as follows:
The swim meet took off in an outstanding fashion with Amelie Austin (Year 11), Laura Littlejohn (Year 13), Sophie Perry (Year 12), and Alina Zabel (Year 12) winning gold in the senior girls' 4x100m freestyle relay on the first night. This is the first time St Paul’s has won a four person relay at national championships.
The girls then followed up with a silver medal in the senior girls' 4x50m freestyle race. Laura Littlejohn and Samuel Peoples (Year 13) teamed up to win gold in the mixed senior 2x50m freestyle relay.
Laura Littlejohn and Sophie Perry then won the senior girls' 2x50m freestyle relay.
Laura Littlejohn, Sophie Perry, Ollie Mouat (Year 11) and Boston Tordoff (Year 12) also gained silver in the senior mixed 4x50m medley relay.
Laura Littlejohn, Sophie Perry, Ollie Mouat and Samuel Peoples gained silver in the 4x50m freestyle senior mixed relay.
In the individual events, Laura Littlejohn won seven events in the senior girls' races, including 50m, 100m and 200m freestyle races, the 50m butterfly, the 100m backstroke, and the 100m and 200m individual medley races. During the meet, Laura also set two New Zealand age group records in the 18-year-old girls' 100m and 200m freestyle.
Ollie Mouat won gold in the 15-year-old boys' 50m butterfly and claimed silver in the 100m butterfly.
Boston Tordoff took bronze in the senior boys' 100m breaststroke.
Other swimmers to have a top eight finish in an individual event included Sophie Perry, Alina Zabel, Samuel Peoples, Amelie Austin and Ben Haskell (Year 13).
Congratulations to the St Paul’s Swim Club and the coaching staff on an outstanding performance!