Following four days of competition at the Caribbean Island Swimming Championships, Bermuda National coach Ben Smith said, “This is the best result we have had for an competition in the region. The young athletes and our senior athletes combined to have an amazing result that has really solidified Bermuda's position in our region.”
Bermuda collected a total of 34 Medals, 7 Gold, 11 Silver and 16 Bronze, that were 12 Age Group Records set, 5 National Records broken and 2 Caribbean Island Swimming Championships records broken.
There were also 75 Personal Best achieved, Smith also wanted to clear you some of the confusion regarding the Qualification for Rio.
Smith said, “The only way to qualify for the Olympics is to get the A cut. The B cut is called a selection time which gives you an opportunity to be selected. The top 4 swimmers in the world with the B cut in each event are the ones who will be selected. Julian Fletcher and Rebecca Heyliger have the B selection time but are not top 4. There is a category call Universality which enables every country in the world to have representatives at the Games with 1 female and 1 male. They are the two who can be selected for Universality places because they attended last Summer's world Championships in Kazan. Roy Allan Burch did not and could not attend Kazan because of his injury. That is why he is not eligible for Universality and needed to get the A time or top 4 B. This is the same case for Lisa Blackburn who did not attend Worlds in Kazan either.”
“Burch swam the selection time in the relay but it didn't count because the relay was mixed gender. He knew that he had to swim faster to be selected and swam the B cut in the heats on Saturday morning with 22.91 and then lowered that time to 22.79 in the finals. Blackburn gave her best effort in the 100 Breaststroke final but was unable to reach the selection time. This means that we now have 3 swimmers with the B selection time and will have to wait for the selection process to be completed. The 4 athletes have done Bermuda proud with their efforts towards making the time for Rio. It is never easy to make cuts between team mates friends and great competitors for your country. I am proud to have worked with all of them up to this deadline and now we will wait to see the final outcome,” concluded Smith.
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