On the 11th and the 12th of November, our swim team went to race in the annual ISB Swimfest. ISB is one of the biggest swimming events our school has been invited to, with 22 other schools attending, such as Concordian, St Andrews, Bangkok Prep and Shrewsbury, with over 1,000 students attending. There are many different races in ISB that our swimmers had to swim; 200, 100, and 50-meter races of all the strokes, butterfly, backstroke, breaststroke and freestyle.
There was a lot of competition between the schools, but some of the racers still talked to the other racers to calm each other’s nerves, as it shows sportsmanship and friendliness between the swimmers.
Anthea (G7) said, “I think ISB is really nerve wrecking but quite fun at the same time,” while Laura and Hana said that they felt more nervous and intimidated than usual because ISB is a big school and the ISB Swimfest is a very big competition.
This year was our best year of swimming, as we finished 14th place out of 22 schools, and were able to score over a 100 points for the first time with 131 points! Last year and in 2015, we were only able to place 17th out of 20 schools, with 64.5 points in 2016 and only 21 points in 2015.
Most of the primary races had somewhere between 90-130 swimmers, and the secondary races had around 40-70 people swimming. Gunn from Grade 8 had the best placing, winning bronze in the 100m breaststroke out of 45 swimmers, and Prue from Grade 6 scored the most points for us. The only way to score points is by placing 12th or higher, which is really hard to do.
An honourable mention is Kym, who placed seventh for both of her individual events–100m breaststroke and 50m freestyle, and Luca, who came second in his 50m freestyle, fifth in his 100m backstroke and seventh in his 100 breaststroke. The girl’s relay team placed 12th for both their relays, 50m freestyle and 50m medley.
During the Swimfest, there was a lot of food that was being sold outside the gymnasium that everyone was staying, and the swimmers were all welcome to look through and buy whatever they wanted to eat. There were waffles, incredibly expensive ice cream, Thai food and sandwiches being sold. The swimmers who were waiting for their races could also run around the field if they felt like it.
Everyone had a great time at this competition, there was a lot of laughter and smiles as our swimmers goofed around, playing with each other and refusing to take ONE good picture just to annoy me (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻
KIS Today 