Swimming: Ellie Eastwood wins two golds

Ellie Eastwood.Photo/Supplied

A few weeks ago, Whangarei's Ellie Eastwood stole the show for the Northland contingent at the Auckland Age Group Championships by claiming two gold medals in one day. Ellie only competed on one day of the three-day competition, winning gold in the girls' 13 years 200m breaststroke and the 400m freestyle before finishing fourth in the 200m individual medley. She also qualified for the Open A final in the 200m breaststroke, finishing a close sixth. After backing up her performances on the day, Ellie has backed up her efforts with an interview with The Northern Advocate.

You had a particularly busy day at Auckland Age Groups a few weekends ago - how was that for you? Was it a surprise that you were fine to back up your swim earlier in the day?

It's quite hard racing in three longer distance events in the same day, especially when I got into the Open A final for the 200m breaststroke, so I had to swim that again that same night. But the three events (200m breaststroke, 400m freestyle and 200 individual medley) were spaced out OK and so I had plenty of rest between to recover - my coach Monica Cooper gives us plenty of tips on recovering after racing which is an important part of competing.

Out of the 200m breaststroke and 400m freestyle, which you won gold in, which is your favourite? Or what is your favourite race and why?

Probably 200m breaststroke, as this is my best stroke, but I am getting better at freestyle, especially distance freestyle. I like 200m breaststroke as you have to plan with your coach how you are going to swim it rather than a straight sprint like in the 50m events.

What happens for you now? Do you get a break over summer or will you be training through?

No, we pretty much train through. We will be starting to train twice a day soon because we have the Northland Age Group Champs in mid-January, and then we start to build up for the nationals.

In terms of next year, and beyond, what are your goals? Do you have any aspirations of swimming for New Zealand or are you someone who takes things as they come and will see what happens?

Next year my goal is to qualify for New Zealand Opens and to place in my age group at the national age group champs. I would like to go as far as possible in my swimming - if that means swimming for New Zealand that would be pretty cool and that is my ultimate goal, but that's still a long way off.

I've been competing in the sport for ages and people always ask what my favourite part of swimming is; what's yours?

For me it's being part of a squad that trains hard but also has a good time while we're doing that - most people think swimming is an individual sport but we train as a team and it's good to get that support from teammates both at training and when you compete. It's quite a hard sport because we have to train so much but it teaches you a lot about all kinds of stuff.