By BRENT STUBBS
Senior Sports Reporter
bstubbs@tribunemedia.net
STILL reeling from their success at a number of international meets this year, the Bahamas Swimming Federation is looking forward to another grand showing when a six-member team will represent the Bahamas at the 22nd Central American and Caribbean Games.
The games are scheduled for November 14-30 in Veracruz, Mexico, and swimming will be among the various disciplines that will carry the Bahamian flag. Among the others are track and field, boxing, cycling, men’s volleyball, men’s basketball, judo, bowling and wrestling.
Coached by veteran coach Andy Knowles, the swim team will comprise of Arianna Vanderpool-Wallace, Joanna Evans, Margaret Albury-Higgs, Ariel Weech, Vereance ‘Elvis’ Burrows and Matthew Lowe. Dustin Tynes also qualified but opted not to compete as he focuses on his freshman year at Ohio State. Laura Morley also opted not to compete because of school commitments.
Federation president Algernon Cargill said the CAC Games have traditionally been a successful meet for the Bahamas and he’s looking forward to the trend to continue.
“We have the number one swimmer in the Caribbean and in the entire region in Arianna Vanderpool-Wallace,” Cargill said. “So we expect her to do extremely well at CAC. Also, Joanna Evans is seeded very high in her events, so we expect the team to perform at a very high level.
“We are optimistic that we will win several events at CAC in the individual events and we are also fielding three relay teams for the women in the 4 x 100 metres freestyle, 4 x 100 metre medley and 4 x 200 metre freestyle.”
Coming out of an historic performance at the 20th Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, Scotland, Vanderpool-Wallace’s silver medal performance in the women’s 50m fly of 25.53 has her pegged as the top qualifier for the games. She is also in that same position in the 50m free with 24.34 and 54.37 in the 100m free.
Weech, a recent graduate of the University of Nebraska who also had a solid performance at the Commonwealth Games, heads into the CAC Games with a fourth seed in the 50m free in 25.72 and third in the 100m free in 56.50. Weech is also 8th in the 50m fly with 28.42.
And Evans, who swum well at the Commonwealth Games before she went on to secure a silver at the Youth Olympic Games in Nanjing, China, is ranked at number two in her specialty in the 800m free in 8:39.75 and the 400m free in 4:12.14. She is also fifth in the 200m free in 2:04.19 and 16th in the 100m free in 58.51.
As for Albury-Higgs, who didn’t compete in any of the two meets, she is listed at No.8 in the 100m breast in 2:14.04 and 12th in the 100m breast in 1:14.91.
On the men’s side, Burrows, another member of the Bahamas team at the Commonwealth Games, is 7th in the 50m fly in 24.74 and tied at No.14 in the 50m free in 23.24, while Lowe is 13th in the 1,500m free in 16:19.77. Lowe didn’t compete in the Commonwealth Games.
Had he decided to compete, Tynes would have been sitting pretty good after his performance at the Commonwealth Games. He is currently fourth in the 100m breast in 1:02.97 and 8th in the 50m breast in 29.08. Morley, on the other hand, is 6th in the 50m breast in 33.47 and 13th in the 100m breast in 1:14.95.
“By any account, we’ve had a very successful year,” Cargill stated. “We’ve gotten very little support from corporate Bahamas, but we won the CARIFTA Games, did very well at CISC and won medals at both the Commonwealth Games and the Youth Olympics.
“So we had a very successful year so far and we are looking forward to the rest of the year with the two remaining meets as we prepare for 2015 where we hope to defend our CARIFTA title and also to have a very good team to compete at the Pan American Games. We are very hoepful that we will continue our success in 2015.”
Immediately following the CAC Games, Vanderpool-Wallace, Evans and Burrows will travel to Doha, Qatar, where they will close out the international circuit as they compete in the 12th FINA Short Course World Championships slated for December 3-7.
In the meantime, the federation will begin its local 2014/15 season on Saturday at the Betty Kelly Kenning Swim Complex when the Sea Waves Aquatics Team hosts their meet at the same time when the Freeport Aquatics Club is set to host a meet in Grand Bahama.
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