Last weekend, the Richmond Rapids brought 75 swimmers to Langley to compete in the Langley Olympians Short Course Invitational. For the first time this year, the Rapids were in a championship-style, heats and finals environment. The top eight swimmers in each event and age group returned in the evening to race again.

This is the setup for nearly all major meets, including BC AA and AAA Provincial Championships and Age Group Nationals. And like those meets, it took good swims in the morning to come back at night. The Rapids had to be on their game, and they were. The team racked up 136 finals swims over the two-day event.

So what makes the difference in finals swims? Coach Drew McClure looks for things the athlete can change.

“In this kind of setup, I’m looking for improvement of an aspect of their race from the morning,” said McClure. “I’m not expecting to see anything like an increase in fitness or technical ability - there hasn’t been enough time. What I want is for the athlete to fix a mistake from their first swim, whether technical or tactical, that they have control over. New mistakes are also very welcome.”

This was also the first event of the year with a full order of events - many that the Rapids hadn’t swum yet this season. This was a significant test of technical ability, fitness, and focus, where skills like maintaining speed on turns and finishing strong had to be proven.

Head Age Group Coach Dennis Silva was satisfied with much of the skill conversion from practice to performance. It’s great to start out strong and controlled in practice, but it matters little if that attribute can’t be deployed during a race. The Rapids swimmers did a solid job of applying their work.

“This is about the best I’ve ever seen our athletes look at this point in the season. The work they’ve put in on technique was certainly showing,” said Silva.

Top three finishers are listed below. Coming up soon for the Rapids is their annual FastSwim Classic, hosted at Watermania.