Other Activities

Bangkok Swim Meet
Bangkok, Thailand - 9 to 11 December 2006

The Hammerheads swim team returned Monday afternoon from Bangkok where we competed against 6 other swim teams, from Thailand, Singapore and China, in a large and exciting international swim meet organized by the Bangkok Patana School. Our team of 48 swimmers from ages 8 through 18 swam on Saturday and Sunday in over 250 individual and relay events.

As a team, UNIS had a combined total of 16 gold, 15 silver, and 9 bronze medals, in addition to a number of 4th through 7th place ribbons. The Hammerheads’ combined team score over the 2 days put us in 3rd place overall out of the 7 teams. Three trophies were awarded for: girls’ age 15 and over team score; girls’ 15 and over individual score 2nd place (Felicia Kodderitzsch); and girls’ 15 and over individual score 3rd place (Shizuka Oinaga).

Perhaps most exciting of all is that 7 meet records were set by upper school Hammerheads girls! Individual event records were set by Nina Reinhardt (50 Breaststroke), Shizuka Oinaga (two – 25 Freestyle and 50 Butterfly) and Felicia Kodderitzsch (50 Freestyle). Three relay records were set by the fearsome foursome of Maarit Mukala, Cherry Griffiths, Shizuka Oinaga and Felicia Kodderitzsch in the 200 Freestyle, 100 Medley and 200 Medley relays.

Not to be overshadowed were the courageous and determined 'can-do' Hammerheads from the elementary school. Each of these 20 young competitors swam with all their heart, striving to achieve their personal bests. It was magical and wonderful to have seen these future champions rising before 6 a.m., swimming warm-ups by 7:30, racing throughout the day, cheering their teammates the rest of the time, managing the pre-race butterflies in their stomach, and then finding strength to do it all again the next day. Indeed our youngest boys of 8 years old - Callum Kilpatrick, Nils Jaranovs, Tariq Bethune, and Sirapope Tanyapuch came away with bronze medals for the 100 Freestyle Relay!

Coaches Andrea Brown, Ella Jaranova, Rachel Poff, Heather Westwood and myself are very proud of the hard work put in by all our swimmers over the last 4 months in preparation for our 1st competition of the year and in each of their performances this weekend.

Many special thanks also go out to those gracious parents who accompanied us on the trip. It would have been impossible to lead, escort, arrange, supervise and coach such a large team over the course of 4 days. Parents, your help was everywhere evident and effective. We could not have done it without you, so please take pride sharing in the team’s accomplishments!

Congratulations to our great 48!

Coach Healy