NINE young swimmers from the Hamilton Swim Club will be advancing to the Victorian Country Shortcourse Championships in Ballarat next month after posting impressive qualifying times at the Hamilton swim meet last weekend.

Zoe Rouse, Lachlan Rees, Stella Raymond, Emily Jellie, Dominic Hoggard, Angus Knight, Archie Dahl, Imogen Wedding and Harvey McKay will all travel to Ballarat in pursuit of placing and going further to the state championships.

The swim meet was a great showing, not just for those outstanding performers who will be going to the next level, but for all those kids who got back in the pool to swim competitively again or for the first time.

Swim club president, Ange Rouse said the day went really well and was excited to see all the talented young swimmers racing.

“It was a fantastic turnout; we had a series which is the first time we’ve run one in a number of years, and it was a huge success,” Rouse told The Spectator.

“It was great to see the south-west of Victoria all coming together for our meet … Hamilton was represented by many ages; we have a lot of younger swimmers coming through now which is great to see.”

Maxine Baring coaches the juniors and said despite the tough restrictions COVID placed on swimming, the number of juniors coming through the ranks was a big positive for the club.

“We have a lot of new juniors, there is a lot of new swimmers to the club who are far less experienced and for them, (meets are) an opportunity to get in and practice not just their technique, but the racing skills they have learned in a training environment,” Baring said.

Baring said there was kids from as young as seven years old that competed at the meet right through to the more experienced swimmers who were 16-17.

There was 38 kids who raced at the Hamilton swim meet on Sunday and of those, nine will travel to Ballarat for the championships which are on July 30.

“We have nine swimmers heading down there which is pretty exciting for a small club,” Rouse said.

“(Our hope is that) the kids make a placing; it would be fantastic to see some of these kids make it through to the next level.

“They’re qualified for many events, I’d say freestyle is our strongest event, they have to get qualifying times in the meets to be able to enter into this and go to the next level.”

While some of the Hamilton swimmers had already put up good enough qualifying times at earlier meets, it was about improving on their time and trying to qualify in other events.

Club captain, Zoe Rouse said it was awesome to be back in the water and see so many swimmers participate last in last Sunday’s meet.

“We had a lot of juniors get involved and it was a good meet, lots of people achieved new personal best times on the day,” she said.

“I was in most events, I’m getting close to qualifying for backstroke, I’m only a second off at this point (and) dropped six seconds (off my time) on the weekend.”

The 17-year-old swimmer who also spends some of her time coaching some of the younger groups, couldn’t wait to travel to Ballarat and show the rest of the competition what she is made of.

“I’m very excited …I want to set some PB’s and get more time off for what I’ve qualified in and hopefully see as many swimmers from our club down there,” she said.

“I think that (going to the next stage) is every kid’s dream at the moment, to get through all the different levels.”

The young enthusiast said she was grateful to be back in the pool after all the time that has been spent on the sidelines over the past couple years.

“Fabulous, nothing can beat it, even during COVID it was a struggle get through, you’ve just got to stay active, I think everyone is appreciative to get back into it,” she said.