2017 Scottish National Age Group C’ships Day 3 Recap

2017 SCOTTISH NATIONAL AGE GROUP CHAMPIONSHIPS (SNAGS)

• Wednesday, March 29th – Sunday, April 2nd
• Aquatics Centre in Aberdeen
• LCM
• Live Stream
• Day 1 Recap/Day 2 Recap
• Results

The competition continued in Aberdeen, with Scottish youth battling it out in the pool hoping to notch a Commonwealth Youth Games consideration time to make the 10-spot roster for the Bahamas meet in July. Even with individual qualification at stake, team points are heavily-eyed throughout the age group competition. Heading into day 3’s competition, here is how the team point totals looked for the top 5 squads after the first two nights only:

1. Warrender Baths Club – 553
2. University of Aberdeen Performance – 372.5
3. South Lanarkshire Swimming – 349
4. City of Glasgow – 295
5. Heart of Midlothian – 178

In terms of qualifying for the Commonwealth Youth Games later this summer, Scottish Swimming’s qualification criteria has dictated that a total of 10 swimmers will be selected to represent Youth Team Scotland at the event. To be eligible for consideration, swimmers must achieve a time equal or faster than those listed in the following table. The times must be achieved either at this SNAGs meet, or at next month’s British World Championships Trials/National Championships.

Additionally, the eligible age categories for swimming in the Youth Games are 15-18 for males (born 1999/2000/2001/2002) and 14-17 for females (born 2000/2001/2002/2003.

With that criteria in mind, two female swimmers notched consideration times for the Commonwealth Youth Games. 17-year-old Nikki Miller of South Lanarkshire Swimming scored the win in the women’s 17-18 age group’s 400m freestyle event, touching in a swift 4:19.04. That time falls just .07 of a second beneath the CYG consideration time of 4:19.11, as Miller’s result was the only sub-4:20-second outing of the night.

Heart of Midlothian’s Keanna MacInnes was another consideration time-scorer, having earned the victory in the women’s 17-18 200 butterfly. MacInnes commanded the win in a monster time of 2:11.24, the best outing of her young career. Heading into this meet, MacInnes’ fastest was the 2:11.61 thrown down at the Arena Pro Swim Series in Indianapolis last earlier this month. Both times represent the only instances of the young athlete having dipped beneath the 2:12 mark.

Her performance tonight slides MacInnes into the world’s top 25 times in the world so far this season in the women’s 200m butterfly:

Also competing in the morning heats as exhibition was Aberdeen native Hannah Miley, who doubled up on the 400m freestyle and 200m butterfly. The 28-year-old managed times of 4:17.21 in the former and 2:16.69 in the latter, as the Olympian got some good training swims in with just a few weeks before April’s National Championships.