16-year-old Gabrielle Fa’amausili won 6 events at the New Zealand Age Group Championships, as the nation selected its team for the Junior Pan Pacific Championships.
Day 1
A pair of national age records dropped on opening night, and two different swimmers joined the New Zealand squad for Junior Pan Pacs.
14-year-old Josh Gilbert broke a national age record in the 100 breaststroke, going 1:06.16, the second time he’s broken the record in the past few weeks.
In the same event, 18-year-old Mario Koenigspeger broke a national age record with a 1:01.80 – that’s more than a second faster than he had previously set the mark at.
With Koenigspeger too old to qualify for Junior Pan Pacs, only two girls made qualifying times on day 1. Mya Rasmussen did so in the 400 IM with a 4:50.42 prelims effort. The 15-year-old will be joined by 17-year-old Yeonsu Lee, who went 2:04.23 in the 200 freestyle.
Day 2
Gilbert returned on day 2 to go 30.45 in the 50 breaststroke, again breaking the 14-year-olds national age record.
The spotlight that day, though went to Gabrielle Fa’amausili, who broke her own 16-year-olds 100 back record with a 1:00.76, and qualified for the Junior Pan Pac team.
Joining her on the team was Hayley McIntosh, who went 4:20.40 in the 400 freestyle to make the qualifying standard.
Day 3
Fa’amausili returned on day 3 to win the 50 freestyle, hitting the Junior Pan Pacs qualifying time and rattling her own national age record with a 26.11.
Gilbert, too, continued to star, going 2:23.64 to win the 200 breaststroke for his age group and smash his own national age record.
Meanwhile Eliot Lundon-Moore and Zac Reid both qualified for the Jr. Pan Pacs team out of prelims. Lundon-Moore was 2:19.60 in the 200 breast and Reid 4:01.58 in the 400 free. They would both wind up second in the finals.
13-year-old Michael Pickett also broke an age record, going 25.00 in the 50 free.
Day 4
Day 4 saw Fa’amausili and McIntosh both add more swims to their Junior Pan Pacs lineup, while Annabelle Paterson also qualified.
Fa’amausili went 2:15.56 in the 200 backstroke, cutting three seconds from her lifetime-best and showing some budding signs that she could develop into a world threat in all three backstroking distances, after most of her success so far has come in the sprints.
Paterson, meanwhile, went 2:14.30 in the same event to make the Junior Pan Pacs team. She’s 17 years old.
And McIntosh went 8:56.72 in the 800 free to book her second swim at Junior Pan Pacs.
Day 5
The closing session of the meet featured Fa’amausili and Reid both adding further events to their lineups.
Fa’amausili continued to be the star of the meet, bringing her individual event total at Junior Pan Pacs to 4. She went 57.05 in the 100 free beating swimmers of all age groups and qualifying for the international meet. She also won the 50 back in a dominating 28.95, to bring her win total to 6 for the week.
Reid, meanwhile, went 15:58.28 to win the 1500 free and narrowly qualify for the event at Junior Pan Pacs.
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