On Saturday 3^rd March, the St Andrew’s Swimming Teams headed to Nairobi for the IAPS Swimming Championships at Peponi Secondary School. This Championships saw St Andrew’s competing against the best of the best from nine other schools across Kenya.  Our teams have been training hard under the guidance of Mr Mapetla. Having recently competed in two Up-County swimming competitions and the House Gala they were well-prepared and excited for the competition.  Unfortunately, a number of swimmers had to pull out of the event due to illness, leaving the teams without their full strength squad.

 
The day began with the Individual Medley – one of the most taxing of the swimming events, in which competitors must demonstrate skills across the four main strokes. Hannah Kyanda finished in second place in the U11 Girls’ IM, and proudly took her place on the podium. Our next medal was won in dramatic style by Lionel Rezida. He took Gold in the U13 Boys’ Backstroke, in a very competitive race. Lionel won by just 0.19 of a second. He was closely followed by swimmers from Braeburn and Peponi who finished in exactly the same time, and shared the second spot on the podium. St Andrew’s third and final medal saw a return to the podium for Hannah Kyanda. She finished in Bronze medal position in the U11 Girls’ Breaststroke.
 
A further four performances came very close to being rewarded with a medal – Mara Stolarow and Lionel Rezida both finished fourth in close Butterfly races, while Denise Kamurasi finished fourth in Breaststroke and Gabby Stolarow finished fourth in Backstroke. Notably, 16 of our swimmers achieved personal best times at the Championship.