Swimming: Young NZ swimmers capture six medals at Adelaide meet

Photo / Hawkes Bay Today

Waikato swimmer Bradlee Ashby swam into the medals on the fourth day of finals at the Australian age championships in Adelaide.

The Hamilton 15-year-old won the 400m individual medley, after qualifying fastest in the morning heats.

Ashby, coached by John Pike, clocked 4:34.04 to grab his second medal of the meet with a personal best by more than 3sec.

His time was just outside the long-standing national age record held by Danyon Loader.

It was one of six medals for New Zealand swimmers, bringing their tally to 19 in four days, with 15 swimmers qualifying for day four finals.

The other medals went to the Howick Pakuranga trio of Corey Main, Jeffrey Arona-Tuifana'e and his younger brother Bradley Arona-Waqanivavalagi, Auckland's Michael Mincham (Waterhole) and Christchurch's Abbie Johnston (AquaGym).

Main won his second medal with a silver in the 16 years 200m freestyle, establishing a new national age record of 1:52.04 in the final.

Arona-Tuifana'e, the winner of the 100m breaststroke, was third in the 200m final for 16 years in 2:20.89, only of a second outside Glenn Snyders' national age record.

Arona-Waqanivavalagi was third in the 14 years 100m breaststroke in 1:09.72.

Mincham, coached by Gwen Ryan, won his third medal of the championships when he finished second in the 14 years 400m freestyle. Fifth-fastest going into the competition, he recorded a new national age record of 4:03.94.

Johnston won a bronze in the 14 years 100m breaststroke in 1:12.80.

The championships end today.