TORONTO — Sebastian Massabie returned to the pool in record-breaking fashion and broke two more national marks on Saturday. Alisson Gobeil chimed in by eclipsing one of her many records.
Massabie of the Pacific Sea Wolves tripled his haul of new Canadian records with two more strong performances at the Canadian Swimming Championships.
In the men’s 150-metre individual medley para multi-class, Massabie charged home in a 2:59.97 to lower his own SM4 record to under three minutes.
Massabie’s coach, Jy Lawrence, agreed that the competition has been ideal training leading into Paris. “I think he’s looking good,” said Lawrence. “There are some areas we still need to clean up and we are working on making sure the finals are more successful. At trials, he was a lot faster in prelims but I’d say we’ve nailed that (finals) here.”
Massabie was not done and returned to the pool with a new men’s 50-metre freestyle S4 Canadian record (38.03). “I think the 150 was the best because I’m usually a bit slow in breaststroke,” said Massabie when answering which new record he was most proud of after night four. Massabie was not alone in his record-breaking performances. Gobeil of Club de Natation Juvaqua Alma was not going to wait until finals to take down the women’s 50-metre freestyle S5 national mark. Gobeil chased down her previous record of 42.21 with a 41.81 morning swim.
“I felt I really trained for this and I am very happy my efforts bore fruit,” said Gobeil. “I hope with the 200 individual medley and the 100 freestyle which might let me classify for Australia.”
That is Gobeil’s next goal — the Citi Para Swimming World Series in Australia later this year.
In the women’s 50-metre freestyle, Delia Lloyd of Etobicoke Swimming took home her third national title of the meet with a quick personal best of 25.29.
Lloyd added the title to her list, which also includes the women’s 100-metre backstroke and the 100-metre freestyle all in the 15-17 age group.
Shortly after, Jordi Vilchez of the Barrie Trojan Swim Club also secured a third national title thanks to a strong swim in the men’s 400-metre individual medley.
Vilchez’s swim of 4:25.15 added to his 16-18 age group titles from the previous days of competition in which he won both the 400-metre freestyle and the 200-metre butterfly.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 27, 2024.
