The Queen’s swimming team gave a solid performance at the uOttawa Queen’s Invitational this past weekend. Competing against four other teams, the men’s side accumulated 86 points to place second overall, while the women placed third with 50 points.
The team collected three gold medals, with Edmund Swan winning the 200-metre butterfly, Kelsey Wibbing winning the 200-metre butterfly and Jen Arthur winning the 50-metre butterfly.
The meet gave the team a chance to compete at home for the first time this season, with Saturday’s events being held at Queen’s after Friday’s Ottawa portion of the event.
Arthur said swimming at home made a huge difference.
“This was our most fun meet with all the support, and seeing people sing the Oil Thigh was great,” she said. “The fan support was phenomenal.”
Men’s team captain Chris Kreutzner said swimming in Kingston energized the team “I think people swam better when they were here. We just came off a nine-day training camp in Florida and had a tough week of practice after that, but everyone got up, got excited and swam pretty well.”
Although the team had favourable results, head coach Viki Raymond said they try to focus on progressing throughout the year.
“We don’t really worry about placings. We’re just worried about how fast we’re swimming, so for this time of year … they’re where they should be right now.” Kreutzner and Arthur had particularly impressive results. Along with her first-place finish, Arthur recorded a second-place finish in the 50-metre freestyle.
“I think I performed the same as my teammates,” she said. “We’ve been working really hard and the boost of the support this weekend definitely helped me to put out the best time for the 50 ’fly.”
Kreutzner finished in the top four in all of his events, including two second-place finishes in the 50- and 200-metre breaststroke events. “I feel as though I could have gone slightly faster. I was hoping for first place, especially in front of a home crowd,” Kreutzner said. The invitational marked the team’s last competition before the OUA finals in February.
“Now we’ll taper down in the last few weeks, and get ready for OUAs,” Raymond said.
With OUAs a month away, Kreutzner said the team may have to adjust to practicing harder.
“[The wait] might prove an issue with some of the more inexperienced swimmers,” he said. “We’re going to work on that as much as possible in practice to get in the race frame of mind, which is a lot more high-tempo.” Arthur added they expect a few swimmers to have berths in the nationals.
“I expect a lot from the team because I know what we’re capable of.”
All final editorial decisions are made by the Editor(s) in Chief and/or the Managing Editor. Authors should not be contacted, targeted, or harassed under any circumstances. If you have any grievances with this article, please direct your comments to eic@queensjournal.ca.