The Casey TigerSharks’ All-Junior finalists – clockwise from top: By Marc McGowan
THE junior Casey TigerSharks finished their season in style with an impressive showing at the Metro All-Junior Finals at Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre on the weekend.
As their older teammates prepared to head north for the Australian Age Championships, the younger TigerSharks performed brilliantly on their biggest stage.
The usual suspects led from the front, with eight-year-old Jake Duggan collecting three of the club’s five gold medals.
Nine-year-old Jake Templar and 10-year-old Arnon Lodder were Casey’s other gold medallists.
Templar and Lodder joined Duggan in winning the 50-metre breaststroke to give the TigerSharks a sweep of the event in the eight, nine and 10-year-old age groups.
The other two medallists were 12-year-old Olivia Raiti (bronze) and nine-year-old Matthew Shaw (one silver and one bronze).
Casey’s complete medal haul was five gold, three silver and three bronze.
Ten of the club’s swimmers made a total of 22 finals to highlight its ever-increasing depth.
TigerSharks assistant coach James Fox was delighted with the results, but placed more emphasis on individual improvement.
“Almost all of the kids that swam (in the finals on Sunday) bettered their times from the semi-finals on Saturday, so it was definitely a good meet,” he said.
“Ultimately for those guys, we’re not looking for placings; it’s mainly about personal-best times or at least beating their semi-final times.”
The junior swimmers have a short break now, but Fox said they would be back in the pool soon.
“We’ve basically just had our club championships and now the All-Junior Finals and it seems to die down now for the younger kids,” he said.
“They’ll probably have two weeks off and a lot of families tend to go away in that time.
“They definitely all did a really good job and as a team to get 10 up to finals was a good effort.”
