The second month of the Golden Flipper Butterfly Challenge is complete and interim November results are now posted. BC is holding a strong lead with 1098 points, while Alberta has 672 points.
BC is in the lead in both the overall Men and Women categories. However, Alberta has overtaken BC in the Women YOB 2007 & 2008 categories and the race is very tight in the Women Open category with only 5 points separating the 2 provinces. BC exploded out of the gate and is still holding strong, with significant leads in all the Male age categories. We are a very strong competitor, but Alberta will find opportunities to pull ahead in the coming months.
Maintaining our lead requires the collective efforts of our clubs, coaches, and swimmers. A couple of things you can do are: one, put effort into developing better dolphin kick, fly starts, turns, and stroking and two, challenge yourself by entering the 50, 100, and 200 butterfly events in competition or submit results from unofficial in-house butterfly swims.
The Golden Flipper Butterfly Challenge will continue through the 2021-22 Season.
The first relay provincial record of the season fell last weekend at the SKSC Sprint Meet. The Surrey Knights relay team consisting of Luke Stewart-Beinder, Yu Tong Wu, Peter Huang & Jack Hayhoe broke the Men 15-17 SCM 4 x 50m Freestyle Relay with a time of 1:33.80.
We are one month into this season Golden Flipper Challenge and the October results are now posted. Swim BC leads with 1047 points to Alberta’s 560 points.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and different restrictions in place in the two provinces, Swim BC has had a distinct advantage at the onset of this challenge. While Swim Alberta has had a slow start they will be gearing up for more racing and great butterfly performances into the coming months.
Maintaining our lead requires the collective efforts of our clubs, coaches, and swimmers. A couple of things you can do are: one, put effort into developing better dolphin kick, fly starts, turns, and stroking and two, challenge yourself by entering the 50, 100, and 200 butterfly events in competition or submit results from unofficial in-house butterfly swims.
The Golden Flipper Butterfly Challenge will continue through the 2021-22 Season.
Across both provinces, 53 Clubs have participated in the Challenge through either sanctioned competitions or in-house time trials. In October, the top 5 scoring clubs overall are:
1. Hyack Swim Swim – 177 Points
2. University of Calgary Swim Club – 174 Points
3. Vancouver Pacific Swim Club – 130 Points
4. Kelowna Aquajets Swim Club – 114 Points
5. University of Calgary Varsity – 75 Points
The top 5 scoring BC clubs are:
1. Hyack Swim Club – 177 Points
2. Vancouver Pacific Swim Club – 130 Points
3. Kelowna Aquajets Swim Club – 114 Points
4. Island Swim Club – 71 Points
5. Simon Fraser Aquatics – 70 Points
In the individual results, total points earned across all age categories are: Women
• Alberta – 291 Points
• BC – 526 Points
Men
• Alberta – 269 Points
• BC – 531 Points
Great job BC! Keep up the hard work in November. Alberta is back in the water and ready to give us a real fight.
Swim BC and Swim Alberta have come together to create a friendly rivalry to develop spirit, story, and a rallying cry to inspire and motivate coaches and swimmers to improve their butterfly development.
The challenge is open to all fully registered swimmers in the competitive category in their respective provinces. Paralympic swimmers must have a Level 2 classification. Olympic Events include the 50m, 100m and 200m Butterfly. Paralympic Events include S1 – S7 50m Butterfly & S8 – S14 100m Butterfly.
“We are aiming for novel ways to capture excitement and interest in swimming fast through all of the age groups.”, Dr. Stephen Norris, Swim Alberta’s Performance Technical Director explained. “It’s highly competitive and friendly fun rivalry between the provinces. It’s meaningful competition that raises the stakes with an edge to it. I can only see this growing.”
Butterfly development was chosen to build on underwater dolphin kicking as well as basic butterfly techniques. It is easily the weakest stroke in our country and BC & AB want to build strong swimmers with skills that will advantage Canada in future international competitions.
“The Golden Flipper Challenge is an innovative initiative designed to re-engage our swimming community.”, Cory Beatt, Swim BC’s Technical Director said. “Swim BC is looking forward to this challenge with Swim Alberta and to developing a healthy rivalry between our two provinces.”
Rankings will be posted at the end of each month from October 2021 – August 2022. The winning province will be announced in September 2022.
Both Directors are excited about the friendly challenge between the provinces and shared their words of encouragement.
“Swim Alberta is a worthy rival and Swim BC will require its collective efforts in this challenge.” Cory Beatt said, “[The goal is] keeping the WEST the BEST. Good luck to all participants from Alberta and BC.”
Steve shared Alberta’s pride is on the line’ and every swimmer can be a part of this challenge. “Eventually [this will lead us to] contributing to future Canadian performances on the world stage”.
Swim BC is the provincial governing body for competitive swimming in British Columbia (swimbc.ca) and Swim Alberta is the governing provincial body for Competitive Swimming in Alberta (swimalberta.ca).
