Apr 10 / 11       Amber & Tom display Amber's Paralympic Trials medals

  Amber & Tom display Amber's medals from this year's Paralympic Trials.



  For those of you that didn't see it in the Sherwood Park News, here are links to a couple of recent articles

http://www.sherwoodparknews.com/articledisplay.aspx?archive=true&e=3535093

http://www.sherwoodparknews.com/articledisplay.aspx?archive=true&e=3519926

  While most of Silver Tide was on Spring Break, 2 of our athletes were off to Montreal for the 2012 London Olympic Trials. I've already heard from many of you that you watched the Finals each night on CTV Sportsnet, and young Emma Funk and her family went so far as to come right out to Montreal and watch in person (Emma's cousin is also a Breaststroke specialist who finished 2nd in his best event). It was the most exciting swim meet held in Canada to date, and the spectacle of a live television broadcast definitely raised the energy on deck and the profile of our sport to Canadians as a whole.

  Amber Thomas swam all 6 Paralympic events (50 Free, 100 Free, 400 Free, 100 Back, 100 Breast, and 200 IM), and medalled in 3 events, taking Gold in the 400 Free with a new Canadian record (and a time that ranks her 2nd in the World this year!), and Bronze in the 100 Free and 200 IM. Amber also set a Canadian record in the 50 Free in the S11 category for disabilities. For those of you who are new to the club and have not met Amber, she is a 100% blind athlete who is among the fastest blind swimmers ever in Canada.

  We have to wait until June for the official announcement of the Canadian Paralympic Team, however Amber's 400 Freestyle time of 5:19 was the highest scoring swim (1062 IPC points) of any para-swimmer in the meet. That essentially assures her selection to the London Games - though we will be sure to share the official announcement when it happens in about 2 months.

  Nadine Williams swam the 400 Free to a best time and the 800 Free to the fastest time this season, finishing as an alternate to the A final. She moved up her ranking in each event, which is always a good sign that you are swimming well relative to the rest of the swimmers in an event.

  Still upcoming is the final Canadian Olympic Trials Qualifier for the 10km Open Water event, on April 24th in Cancun, Mexico. Nadine will battle the best distance swimmers in Canada for a chance to represent Canada at the World Selection Trials for the 2012 Olympics, which will be held on June 10th in Setubal, Portugal for the 2 fastest athletes from every country in the world. Nadine's path to Olympics requires her to be the #1 Canadian finisher in Mexico, followed by a Top 15 finish in the World Trials in Portugal.

  Congratulations to our Silver Tide national swimmers. And to the next wave of Silver Tide swimmers: remember that Nadine and Amber were once young girls in a Junior Development program, and didn't always have their National and Provincial times. They had to qualify for each meet, one at a time, and they did every workout the best they could until eventually they got to where they are today... and they are still doing the same thing today to try and make it to the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

  If you work hard enough, you will earn lots of improvement in your swims - who knows who will be the next National Team member from Silver Tide?

Go Tide!
Coach Chris

Mar 20 / 11       Swim a thon is April 29th at Kinsmen Edmonton

   Hi everyone.  It is time to start preparing for our annual Swim-A-Thon.  This year the event will be held at the Kinsmen pool in Edmonton on April 29 at 5:00-7:00.  We plan on doing club photographs prior to the swim, so we will get together before hand.  Details of the exact time that we will meet will come out later.  We will also have food and refreshments for the swimmers afterwards.

Please note that we sent out some forms before Christmas with a tentative date on them.  We could not get appropriate pool time that weekend, so the date has changed.  If you haven't started to collect pledges yet, please use the attached forms.  If you have some donations listed on the previous forms, just change the date on the top of the form and continue to use it.

As is described on the attached forms, Swim-A-Thon is a major fundraiser for the club, and each swimmer has a minimum amount that must be raised.  If you raise more than the Swim-A-Thon minimum, the remainder can be used to satisfy your fundraising commitments.  Provided that the donor meets the eligibility requirements (described in the attachment), they will receive a tax receipt from Swim Alberta for the full amount of their donation.  This is a great opportunity for you to meet your fundraising requirements in a way that your donors will get a tax refund.

Swim-a-thon Sponsor Sign-up Sheet

Swim-a-thon information letter

Any questions can be sent to me.

Thanks
Brad Murray
President - Silver Tide Swim Club
President@silvertide.ca

Feb 27 / 11       This year's pictures are on the SmugMug website

  Hi everyone

Here are the instructions in how to get onto the SmugMug photo site to view and download team pictures.

If you click onto this link, http://www.reeves.smugmug.com/ , it will take you to the password log-in screen for the team photo site.  The password is “stsc” (be careful, use lower case letters as this is case sensitive).

I’ve organized the website with into two main areas that you can use to view the pictures from.  If you click onto a person’s name in the keyword area, only the photos of that person will be retrieved for viewing and downloading.

In the gallery categories, I’ve organized the photos into swim meets and team events for both years.  If you select a gallery such as 2010-2011 Swim Meets, all of the sub-galleries for the swim meets will appear for viewing.

If at any time you wish to download a picture for yourself, just hover the mouse over the picture and a selection box will appear on the right side of the picture.  If you press the icon looking like a folder, a box will appear asking if you would like to save this picture to your computer.

Right now the site is a work in progress.  I will be adding more meets and tagging all photos with swimmers names as time permits.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me at golfwiz@shaw.ca.

Ryan

Mar 19 / 11       Silvertide Swim Club is awarded the 2013 Alberta Age Group Trials North

   Silvertide Swim Club has been awarded the 2013 Alberta Age Group Trials North for next year.
As the name says, there will be 2 short course trials next year with us hosting the northern meet.
There will be a few format changes which will be published as they are completed.

Dec 14 / 11       Athlete of the week

   Hi everyone.  Take a look at this report from Tuesday evening Global TV where Silver Tide’s Nadine Williams was profiled as the “Athlete of the Week”

http://www.globaltvedmonton.com/video/nadine+williams/video.html?v=2176460750&p=1&s=dd#video

Way to go Nadine. 

Brad Murray
President, Silver Tide Swim Club

Nov 26 / 11       Poppy meet Aggregates have been revised

   Below is the link to the revised Poppy Aggregate medals.

Revised 2011 Poppy Aggregate medals (PDF format)

Aug 25 / 11       New 2011 / 2012 Pool Training Schedule is available

   The new 2011/2012 pool schedule is out for Millennium Place. Use links below to view.
Dryland training schedule will be available soon.

Schedule 2011/2012 (PDF format)

Schedule 2011/2012 (Word format)

Aug 10 / 11       Nadine 44th and 29th at World Championships!

   Congratulations to Nadine Williams of Silver Tide for finishing 44th in the 10km and 29th in the 5km Open Water events at the 2011 FINA World Championships in Shanghai, China. These Championships were the first of 2 Olympic Qualifier events. The first 10 finishers for each men and women were selected to compete at the 2012 Olympics in London. The final 15 Olympic swimmers will be selected from a meet in June 2012 in Portugal. Only the top 2 swimmers in Canada are eligible to compete in the World Championships.

    Nadine swam very well, in particular in the 5km race where she swam much of the race in the front of the main pack of swimmers. She really showed her improved class by challenging the best girls in the field, and also achieving her best placing of 29th in the deepest and largest World Championships ever assembled.

    The conditions in China were very hot and humid. The air temperature was up to 35 degrees, with 75-80% humidity, which gives a humidex of over 45 degrees. The water temperature was also up to 32.8 degrees, and was measured during competition. The heat caused a record number of drop outs from the race, including former world champion swimmers. It was a far cry from last year in Roberval, Canada, where the water temperature was down to 17 degrees!

    Coach Chris Nelson was also selected to the World Championships coaching staff, and is the first time (on her 3rd World Championships Team) that Nadine has had one of her home coaches with her at a National Team event. 

    Congratulations to both Nadine and Chris on their selection and performances at the FINA World Championships.

Aug 10 / 11       2 STSC swimmers make big finals at Canadian Age Group Nationals

   Silver Tide sent 7 swimmers with Coach Maciek and Chaperone Laura Labonte-McKay to Canadian Age Group Nationals in Montreal, Quebec from July 25-August 1, 2011. This was the largest age group meet yet, with over 1700 swimmers competing in a 6-day competition at a beautiful outdoor pool in Parc Jean Drapeau.

Big Finals:
    Kevin Labonte led off the meet for STSC with a huge swim in the 200 Backstroke. He swam his first ever Western-national cut in the morning, going 2:16.68 and qualifying for finals and next season's Western Nationals. He then followed up with an equal swim of 2:17 in the finals to finish in 6th place of all 14-year-old boys in Canada. Kevin followed that race on Day 2 with a huge swim in the 400 IM. Kevin took advantage of his preliminary swim by being one of only a few top boys to swim a best time in the morning. He took 6 seconds off his previous best to go 4:55 and qualify for finals. He followed that up with an even faster swim, finishing in 4:52 and 5th place overall, smashing another Western National standard in the process. Megan Martin was also on top of things in her 50 Backstroke, qualifying for finals with a 31.7 in preliminaries. She turned it up even more in finals, finishing with a 31.3 and a 7th place finish overall.

Close Calls:
    Silver Tide is getting close to filling up a Senior National qualifier roster. Megan Martin added 50 Back to the events in which she is within 1 second of a senior qualifying time (she was also within 1 second in her 200 Backstroke at Senior Provincials). Karlyn Elford also swam a best time in her 200 Butterfly, coming within half of a second of making her first senior national time. These efforts were both great swims, and both girls will be very excited (can't wait to try again!) for next season and their next chance race at their best.

Notables:
Matt Whiteside, Brendan Elford, and Nathan Weatherby each had strong swims for the boys. Matt broke his first 15-17 club record in the 200 Breast, and he and Brendan each took off more than 5 seconds in their 400 IM swims - they are feeling very motivated for next season. Allison Hender had her best meet of the long course season, swimming best times in 5 out of 5 races.

Aug 10 / 11       Kevin Labonte make World Junior Open Water Tour

  Kevin Labonte qualified for his first national team this summer at Canadian Age Group Championships. Kevin qualified by being one of the top 6 boys in the 5km open water event on the final day of competition in Montreal. The top 6 boys and top 6 girls were selected for a tour of the Canadian segments of the FINA Grand Prix and FINA World Cup circuit: Aug 5-6 in Lac Memphremagog, and Aug 12-13 in Lac Megantic in Sherbrooke, Quebec. These are two of the most important and fastest races in the world for open water swimming. Swimmers on the tour receive a full complement of Swimming Canada gear and racing suits, they take part in a 14-day training camp with video sessions, and they compete in two 10km races, one at each of the FINA events. They also get a chance to watch the incredible Marathon event, a 34km Grand Prix race in LAc Memphremagog where 2011 25km World Champion Petar Stoychev of Bulgaria is expected to compete (he won the 25km race at World Championships in Shanghai, and is a 10 time defending champion of the Memphremagog race!).

Kevin is the youngest boy on the team; the only 14-year-old to make the tour.

His hard work in training and great effort in racing really brought Kevin to a new level this summer. He is clearly one of the best Backstrokers, IM'ers and Freestylers in all of Canada, and he will continue to improve in all events as long as he keeps up these same habits next season. Way to go, Kevin! Silver Tide is very proud to have another national team member this season!