Swimming: Youngsters making big splash

Otumoetai Swim Club members Ruby Matthews (left), Joshua Pickett and Benji Rowe with coach Stefan Swanepoel. Photo/George Novak

The outstanding swim programme run by coach Stefan Swanepoel at Otumoetai Swimming Club continues to produce top-performing athletes.

The most recent success came at the Victorian Age Group Champs in Melbourne last December when three of the club's talented youngsters took on the might of Australia's best swimmers as part of the Aquaknights team.

Ruby Matthews, 14, shocked the Aussies by winning bronze medals in the 100m breaststroke (1:17:51) and 200m breaststroke (2:44:61), with both swims setting new Bay of Plenty records.

Benji Rowe, 13, and Joshua Pickett, 15, finished outside the medals, but performed well in such strong company.

Swanepoel, who was in Melbourne as one of the New Zealand coaches, says he is very proud of how well the three swimmers have developed.

"Josh has been with me for four years now. He started off as a little 10-year-old in our regional training squad and since he first raced at a national level in 2010 he has gone from strength to strength.

"He won his first national medal at the national short course champs and it happened to be a gold medal.

"Ruby has been with us nearly two years now. She started off as a Division 2 swimmer at the start of 2013 and by the end of 2013 she won those two medals in Australia.

"Benji has been here three years and has also gone from strength to strength. He started off as a New Zealand junior when he joined us. He works incredibly hard and he is a very gutsy boy."

Swanepoel has been head coach since 2009 at Otumoetai after coaching at leading Auckland clubs following a distinguished swimming career. He says they have the right mix of programmes to cover all levels.

"We have a junior programme for kids learning to swim competitively. All our littlies do a couple of swims a week and the focus is on slow technique swimming.

"The next squad up are kids that have started racing locally at competitions within Tauranga and if they want to push a little more they go off to Rotorua and swim there.

"From there we have our silver, gold and age squad programmes. Silver and gold programmes are kids that are competing at either New Zealand Junior Nationals or Division 2 champs or Age Group champs.

"We also have the surf or Aqua National programmes for surf kids, triathletes, water polo players. We have this great working relationship with the Mount Maunganui Surf Lifesaving Club. A lot of their athletes come and swim with us and our swimmers go and compete for Mount Surf club."

Swanepoel rates the standard of swimming in Tauranga highly on a national level. "With the talent here we are definitely up there with any other regional town in the country.

"Between Otumoetai and Greerton we have a formidable presence. I have a lot of respect for [Greerton coach] Tai [Daniela] and what he does. He has produced some fantastic swimmers through that programme like Nathan Capp, who is doing extremely well."

Greerton Swimming Club's Blake Horn, Cullum Gilmour and Claudia Capp also performed with distinction in Melbourne, setting personal bests.