The 2015 New Zealand Short Course Championships concluded today, but not before additional national records bit the dust.
Gabrielle Fa’amausili cleared another New Zealand national record, this time with her win in the 50m backstroke. Her time of 27.72 surpassed the previous record of 27.82 held by Emily Thomas since 2009. Fa’amausili’s win tonight brings her total first-place finishes to four over the course of the meet, having already earned victories in the 50m freestyle, 100m IM and 100m backstroke.
Of her performance overall at the championships, Fa’amausili said, “I think I lost my confidence a bit at opens and I’ve definitely gained more of it back this week and hopefully I’ll be fired up to go for Junior Worlds and Youth Commonwealth Games.” She also stated that her training group, United Swimming Club, is an ideal fit for her as “Everyone is so like-minded and driven to do their best in everything and the coach, Igor Polianski, he’ so wise and he gives me more confidence to do better.”
Daniel Hunter of Howick Pakuranga also did some damage to the record books, clocking a 47.61 to top the podium in the 100m freestyle, breaking the New Zealand national mark in the process. Hunter’s time shaved over a tenth off of the previous 47.77 mark set by Michael Jack in 2009.
For his part, Hunter said of his race, “I was just focusing on keeping the same processes going into the race and just making sure that I stick to my routines. I wasn’t quite expecting to go as quick as I did but it was an awesome surprise. I was absolutely stoked, I couldn’t ask for anything more, it was a personal best first of all and to break the New Zealand record was just a bonus on top of that.”
North Shore Swimming Club’s Helena Gasson missed out on claiming her fifth title of the meet, as she settled for second place to Capital Swim Club’s Samantha Lee in the women’s 200m butterfly by less than a tenth of a second. Lee touched in 2:10.05 to take the win over Gasson’s 2:10.14. As such, Gasson gathered a total of four titles, including the 400m IM, 50m butterfly, 200m breaststroke and 200m IM. This total matches her haul of four national titles that she obtained last year as well.
love the article ..i am so proud to be a full blooded Samoa keige .thank you for your wonderful post .i cant wait to read part two .. Another correction — the male s tattoo is called malofie and pe a is the only the name of the small black triangle at the back. It seems there was confusion when the palagi s started recording information and they probably pointed to the back of a man s tattoo and asked what is was and so was told the name of the part on the back they were pointing to.