KUALA LUMPUR: The Singapore Swimming Association recently sent over a hundred swimmers to Malaysia for the 44th SEA Age Group Swimming Championships 2022 from 17 Dec to 19 Dec at the National Aquatic Stadium in Bukit Jalil in Malaysia. The young swimmers ended the meet with 27 medals; four golds, 10 silvers, 13 bronze medals and 40 new personal bests.
Over the three days of competition, the juniors were exposed to competitive swimmers from various regions including hosts Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam, Philippines, Cambodia, and Brunei. Swimming head coach Eugene Chia, said he is feeling optimistic that the young swimmers will continue to perform and give their best in the sport that they are passionate about.
“Improving from day to day and making the right choices have been the central theme of the SEA Age Group Championships this year and the team has had the opportunity to see how these traits can swing results either way,” said Chia, who is also the coach at Singapore Swimming Club.
“The coaching team is confident that the swimmers on the team will learn and seek to improve themselves in their daily training environment and we look forward to a progressively stronger showing in this annual coming together of the swimmers in our region.”
The same sentiment is shared by coach Osamu Gushi who feels that the juniors will only get better if they have more time in the water, competing with other swimmers in the region.
“Young swimmers who couldn’t experience JIC and other major Age Group events came to KL and showed us their great potential! As they experience more competitions, they will improve better and better! The big hope for Singapore!” shared coach Gushi.
“This Singapore SEA Age team is a tier two team. Considering the age gap, our 13 and under and 14-15 age groups can be considered as tier 1 team. For all of them, this is their first international competition and a first-time experience for most of them,” added the Aquatic Performance Swim Club coach.
After the first day of competition, the swimming association posted coach Gushi’s comments on their Facebook stating that while there are many good performances, especially for the sprint events, they need to work on more speed endurance work and more lactate tolerance sets to perform better for the longer-distance events.