Swimming: Tyrrell impresses with three records

Nick Tyrrell (Neptune) broke three South Island open records at the annual short course championships in Invercargill last weekend.

Tyrrell set three of the 16 individual records broken by Otago swimmers at the championships. Otago swimmers also broke five relay records.

Tyrrell (20), an English and music student at the University of Otago, started swimming with Duncan Laing and won his only national championship medal at the great coach's final national championships. He finished third in the short course 200m individual medley.

His three South Island records in Invercargill were the 200m backstroke (2min 01.59sec), 100m individual medley (59.13sec) and 200m individual medley (2min 06.52sec).

The 200m backstroke was also an Otago open record and beat Kurt Crossland's time. It was a personal best time by four seconds.

The other South Island open record by an Otago swimmer came from Braden Doyle (Waves) in the 200m freestyle in 1min 51.26sec.

Otago swimmers also broke three open relay records at the championships. The team of Tyrrell, Matthew Glassford, Rhys Applegarth and Doyle set a new record with a time of 1min 35.54sec in the 200m medley.

Tyrrell, Glassford and Doyle were joined by Adam Simpson when they also set a new mark in the 400m medley relay in 3min 28.84sec.

The women's 400m medley relay team of Kate Godfrey, Lauren Greenshields, Katie Kenneally and Emmabeth Jensen set a record of 4min 15.63sec.

Han Zhang (Neptune) broke six records in the boys aged 13 and under grade. His records were in the 50m (33.16sec), 100m (1min 11.43sec) and 200m (2min 35.03sec) breaststroke, 100m (1min 05.81sec) and 200m (2min 21.80sec) butterfly and the 100m (1min 06.05sec) individual medley.

Jeremy Hopkins (Neptune) broke four records in the same grade - 50m freestyle (26.38sec), 50m butterfly (29,43sec) and 200m (2min 20.46sec) and 400m (4min 57.33sec) individual medley.

Patrick Harris (Queenstown)) broke two records in the same grade in the 50m (30.95sec) and 200m (2min 20.13sec) backstroke.

Harris, Zhang and Hopkins were joined by Bailey Brandham and set a record in the 200m medley relay of 2min 03.38sec.

Neptune swimmers won 21 gold medals and Waves swimmers 10.

Hopkins and Brandham were joined by Jack Harrison and Campbell Pearson when they set a new mark in the 200m medley relay in 1min 50.15sec, Canterbury-West Coast won the regional competition with 1801.5 points from Otago 1553.5, Southland 628 and Eastern Districts 393.

The Wharenui Club, of Christchurch, won the interclub contest with 625 points from Neptune 614 and Waves 470.5. Queenstown was seventh with 190 points.