Islanders win swimming medals in Inverness

Four swimmers from the Lerwick team travelled to Inverness at the weekend to compete in the Aberdeen Dolphins Mitchell Trophy.

A strong line-up had gathered, including teams from Edinburgh University, East Lothian Swim Team, Falkirk and Cumbernauld, as well as a strong representation from the North District.

Callum MacGregor, 17, was in great form in the 15 and over age group, winning a silver medal in the 100m freestyle, bronze in the 50m freestyle and bronze in the 100m butterfly. He narrowly missed out on a podium finish in the 200m freestyle, a personal best only being good enough for fourth place.

Sarah Williamson, 13, competing in the 13/14 age group and recovering from an elbow injury, dug deep in the 200m breaststroke. Finishing on her best time would have been good enough for the bronze medal but she was shocked to discover she had been disqualified for a technical infringement. That did not deter her as in the final of her favourite event, the 100m breaststroke, she put the disappointment behind her to take the bronze with almost a two-second PB. She was beaten by two 14-year-old girls from East Lothian and Falkirk.

Craig Nicolson, competing in the 15 and over group, was on good form and celebrated his 16th birthday during the competition. He was one of the younger competitors in the 15 and over event and did well to qualify for two finals, finishing fifth in the 100m breaststroke with a PB.

In the 50m freestyle final he finished a creditable seventh, in the 200m breaststroke he narrowly missed out on podium finishing fourth and in the 400m freestyle he gained a very creditable fifth. The 200m freestyle saw Craig’s biggest improvement by almost breaking the two-minute barrier with close to a four second improvement.

Also competing in the 13/14 group, Megan Petursdottir was in fine form in the 100m events, although not able to achieve quite the same performances from a week earlier at the Shetland championships where the newly-turned 14-year-old left the opposition in her wake. Her best performance came in the 100m freestyle, finishing in a time of 1.03.80.

She produced an 18-second PB in the 800m freestyle, a 16-seconds improvement in the 400m freestyle and just missed out on going under 29 seconds by five one-hundredths of a second in the 50m freestyle.

Head coach Petur Petursson said: “I am extremely pleased with the guys’ performances. It is always good to see podium finishes. However, the aim of this meet was not for the purposes of collecting gongs but to allow some of Shetland’s top swimmers to compete at the very highest level where they would have to be at their very best.

“It was also an opportunity for me to have their races videoed and over the coming days will allow us to review the races and hopefully make the improvements required to continue being competitive at this level in 2011.

“Thanks must go to Sheila Williamson and Davie Riddell for looking after us so well and to all the officials for giving up their time.”