A 16-member team left the island over the weekend to compete in the Central American and Caribbean Amateur Swimming Confederation (CCCAN) Championship held in Aruba from 26 June – 6 July 2018.
The events kick off on Tuesday with the Artistic Swimming, followed by the Pool Swimming events, which get started on 29 June. The Championships culminate with the Open Water component from 4-6 July. Hundreds of swimmers from 28 countries will take to the water over the 11 days of competition.
Grenada’s 16-member delegation is the largest ever to be representing Grenada at such competition. The team includes swimmers Anaika Charles, Arianne Clouden, Parshawn Haynes, Gabrielle Hyson, Iyannu Antoine, Ifeoma Cherebin, Jenebi Benoit, Kimberly Ince, Zackary Gresham, Meeka Ollivierre, Corey Ollivierre, Kaiya Ramdhanny, Kerry Ollivierre, Sydnee Steele, Dajenel Williams and Delron Felix. Overseas-based swimmer Oreolouwa Cherebin who qualified for this year’s team is unavailable to attend due to academic commitments, while Mia Neckles, who also qualified to attend the event, will be also absent due to injury.
The swimmers have been training from the beginning of 2018 with their eyes on qualifying for the CCCAN team. National Coach, Gerson Escobar has led the team’s preparations and has been supported by Coach Ronald Charles and Damique Walters during this period. The team is managed by Chad Hyson and chaperoned by Grace Clouden. GASA’s President Peron Johnson also travels with the team as head of delegation.
Grenada’s National performance at this meet stands to benefit from the additional training support our swimmers have participated in the over the past few months. Both Kerry and Corey Ollivierre students at Florida School of Technology train and compete with the Florida Swim team, while Delron Felix has been attending the SPIRE Institute in Ohio, where he has received advance swim training to support his development.
Our locally based swimmers also continue to receive additional technical assistance from our visiting coach to the island that has been working with the team on stroke technique, starts and turns. The team also continues to improve their physical conditioning through dry land training and ongoing work with personal trainer Suzanne LaTouche. The combined efforts have shown remarkable improvement in our swimmer’s performances over the past few months.
The competition level at CCCAN is of a much higher caliber of swimmers from a larger region and as such the team expects very tough competition, which will challenge our swimmers to continue to improve on their personal best performances. Coming out of a very strong CARIFTA performance, “our swimmers continue to work hard and we feel they are prepared for the increased level of competition,” says President of GASA, Peron Johnson.
The pool-swimming component of CCCAN concludes on 3 July and Grenada is striving toward personal best performance that result in some podium moments for our swimmers.
GASA
