Golden boy Alex Joachim cops 11 medals in Barbados

Alex Joachim of the Black Sands Swim Squad swimmers won 11 medals in the Titans Aquatic International swim meet held recently at the Barbados Aquatic Centre.

The meet, which took place from October 20 to 23, saw participation from 10 Black Sands Swim Squad swimmers, as well as many other highly competitive swimmers from throughout the region.

Black Sands swimmers brought back a total of 22 medals over the three-day, highly competitive event, with Alex Joachim winning 11 of the 22 medals.{{more}}

Alex swam himself to top spot, winning gold in the boys 11 – 12 years 100 metre backstroke in a time of 1 minute 11.18 seconds, smashing his personal best time by over 11 and a half seconds. He went on to swim amazingly well in his other events, winning five silver and five bronze medals and in doing so achieved many other personal best times. Younger sister Jamie Joachim joined her older brother on the medal podium, proudly winning one silver and one bronze medal and also achieving personal best times.

Shane Cadogan brought home six of the medals to SVG. Cadogan won gold in the 50 metre freestyle, in a time of 26.14 seconds and went on to swim himself to an additional two silver and three bronze medals.

Tia Gun-Munro and Mya Defreitas battled hard in the girls 9-10 years age group, with Tia winning one bronze medal in the 50 metre breaststroke and Mya winning two bronze medals, one in the 50m fly and one in the 200m freestyle. Both girls medalled with personal best times, as well as achieving personal bests in their other events.

Paige Cadogan, Alex Cyrus, Cruz Halbich, Kyle John and Aaron Defreitas also competed as part of the Black Sands Swim Squad and were competitive in all of the events in which they competed.

The Black Sands Swim Squad proved highly competitive, swimming throughout the competition, as well as conducting themselves in a professional manner. Coach Kyle Dougan commented on how proud he was of the performance given by the squad and was pleased to see that continued training and dedication to the sport was paying dividends, with so many podium finishes, as well as personal bests. He also commented on the significance of Alex Joachim’s swimming times, stating that Alex’s times place him in the top 5.7 per cent of boys in the 12-year age group within the whole of the United States of America, a great indication of the high standard of swimming coming out of St Vincent and the Grenadines.