By BRENT STUBBS
Senior Sports Reporter
bstubbs@tribunemedia.net
BIRMINGHAM, England — In looking at the performances of the nine swimmers as they left the Commonwealth Games and are now heading back home, coach Andy Loveitt said Team Bahamas had a successful showing.
“Training prior to competition went very well and at the team meeting prior to competition we set the goal of swimmers attempting to make the top 16 and hopefully a final,” said Loveitt who, along with Travano McPhee, coached the team.
“We achieved both and the swimmers can be extremely happy with their performances.”
Loveitt said if there’s one swimmer that should be singled out, it was Lamar Taylor, who made the final in the men’s 50 metre freestyle and finished 7th to go along with his other events, including 50m Fly 18th ( PB), 50m Back 20th, 100m Back 21st and 100m Free 23rd.
Two swimmers made semi-final appearances with Lilly Higgs in the 50m breaststroke for 15th place and the 100m breaststroke in 16th, while Davante Carey in the 50m backstroke came in 16th in a new Bahamas national record.
Carey also had strong swims in the 200m backstroke in 18th, 100m backstroke in 19th and the 100m butterfly in 25th place. “The 200m races went straight to final from heats and the Bahamas had two top 16 places achieved by Katelyn Cabral coming in 12th in the 200m backstroke and Zaylie Elizabeth-Thompson was 13th in the 200m breaststroke.
“Zaylie also had a 21st place finish in the 200m freestyle and a 34th place finish in the 100m free.
Katelyn had the following other results – 50m backstroke in 24th, 100m butterfly in 28th, 50m butterfly in 34th and 50m freestyle in 46th.”
The other three members of the team, according to Loveitt, all achieved a top 20 finish. Rhanishka Gibbs, the youngest member of the team at age 16, was 17th in the 50m breaststroke, Luke Thompson was 19th in the 400m freestyle in a personal best and Izaak Bastian got 20th in the 50m breaststroke.
Gibbs also had the following results in the 50m freestyle for 22nd in a personal best, 23rd in the 100m breaststroke and 43rd in the 100m freestyle, while Bastian also had a 23rd place in the 100m breaststroke, Luke-Kennedy Thompson was 24th in the 50m breaststroke and 26th with a personal best in the 200m freestyle.
“The team competed in two relays and they narrowly missed making the mixed 400m free relay final with a 9th place finish and they also placed 11th in the mixed 400m medley relay,” Loveitt said.
“I was extremely happy with the overall performance of the team and thank the swimmers for their efforts. I would like to see these results bettered at next year’s Pan American Games in Chile with all relay teams entered and a goal of progressing forward from the results achieved in the last games in Lima, Peru, in 2019.”
The team departed Birmingham yesterday, spending some time in London before they head home today.
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