Tina Hoeben’s wish was granted over the weekend at the Penticton Community Centre.
The KISU swim coach wanted a meet victory and her swimmers delivered to claim the Barnett Construction Triple Pentathlon. KISU topped the Kamloops Classic club, 5,100-plus points compared to 3,700.
“That was great. It was really good for them to start off the season that way,” said Hoeben.
Heading into the weekend, Hoeben talked about the meet being used as a benchmark.
“I think there is lots of room for improvement. It was good to see that,” she said.
Among the swimmers who had great performances were Aspen Benn, Ava Wall, Marlee Caruso, Thomas Caruso, Ashley McMillan and Justin Fotherby. Older swimmers such as Tyler Wall and Jaren LeFranc also had strong meets. Benn, 10, placed in the top-10 for all her events. Others with top 10 finishes in all their events were Marlee Caruso, 12, Thomas Caruso, nine, Fotherby, 12, McMillan, 11, Andreas Nordlund, 10 and Ava Wall, 10. Sean Peters, 10, did place but was disqualified from one event, as was Jordan Souch-Tremblay, 10. Tyler Wall, 14, won all his swims except three in which he placed second.
Samuel Lasinski, 16, accomplished top-10 results in all but one race. Jaren Lefranc, 16, had 11 top-10 finishes. Thomas Caruso felt pretty good about his performances.
“I took off a lot of seconds,” said Thomas, whose best time improvement was in the 400 IM in which he chopped 26.85 seconds. “I got two more AAA times. I have six 3A now.”
Thomas missed his goal by one. His other goal was to complete the 200 IM in less than three minutes, but finished four seconds shy.
Ava said she felt fast in the water. Competing against the other swimmers was easy for her because she is still in the 10 and under category. She was most pleased with her performances in the 200-m freestyle, in which she cut 22 seconds from her time, the 400 IM, cutting 22.66 seconds and the 200-m backstroke, cutting 26.73 seconds.
Theresa Zunich, coach of KISU’s 11 and under group, said her swimmers were amazing. She had them focus on the 200-m fly and 400 IM, events that some of them fear.
“They went ahead and did it, they took charge,” she said.
Adding to the excitement of the results for Hoeben is the fact it came against a strong field. She felt they matched up well against the other swimmers.
“They really showed a lot of great technical skills as well as fitness and speed,” she said.