2018 14TH FINA SHORT COURSE WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS
- Tuesday, December 11th – Sunday, December 16th
- Tennis Centre, Hangzhou Olympic & International Expo Center, Hangzhou, China
- SCM
- Provisional Entry List
- Entries Book
Among veterans such as Cameron McEvoy and Emily Seebohm, there are seven newbies on the Australian line-up competing in Hangzhou this week. Bond University’s Jenna Strauch is one of the rookies set to represent the nation at these Short Course Championships, obtaining her official Dolphins roster #806 just this week.
The 21-year-old will be taking on the women’s 100m and 200m breaststroke on the international stage, appearances of which have been a long time coming. Strauch actually had made the Junior World Championships squad back in 2013, but contracted 3 parasites and wound up in the hospital for over a year and a half.
Looking back, Strauch describes her misery as, “There would be week stints, day visits – they just couldn’t get rid of it. One parasite was masking the other.
“I had salmonella poisoning for nine months before they were able to treat that.” (Gold Coast Bulletin)
Now she is back to her old self, relishing her time at Bond University, and looking ahead to what she can learn from her experience here in Hangzhou.
“Being on team for the first time means there are a lot of firsts, so a bit more sentimental for us. It is nice to be here and soak it all in and learn from other more experienced athletes.
Strauch continued, “The pool has been good, and training has been going really well so overall it has been great and this is also the first time I have seen snow so that is pretty cool.”
McEvoy is on the other end of the experience spectrum, but still enjoying every minute of the Short Course World Championships preparation.
“Thinking back to my first team at the 2012 Olympics, I look back on that and remember vividly the racing but also have really fond memories of spending time with the other athletes and going through the motions of what it was like to be on a tour with the swim team.”
Applying these championships to the overall Tokyo journey, McEvoy continued, “It gives you that experience in uncharted waters in a way because it is so infrequent to race internationally.
“Getting exposure to all those different types of experiences at an international competition is going to help.
“The more surface areas of experience you get to uncover means by the time to get to one of the more important competitions such as the Olympics you have a bigger toolkit to work with as you go into that competition.”
Quotes courtesy of Swimming Australia.
