Chesney finishes as 2023 swimming carnival champions

Cobar High School held their annual swimming carnival last Monday with the Chesney team finishing as the winners ahead of Great Cobar.

Occidental was back in third place with Fort Bourke 4th.

One new school record was set at the carnival with Henry Knight setting a new time for the Under 16s 50 metres Backstroke of 35.01 seconds.

The Age Champions from the day were: U/12 boys Takai Cantrell; U/12 girls

Taylah Wyllie (with Ella Oborn finishing as runner-up); U/13 boys equal 1st Aiden Hyland and Ryder Anderson; U/13 girls

Fairfull (r/up Charlotte Knight); U/14 boys Eli Hodges (r/up Clay McDonald); U/14 girls Alora Deppeler (runners Knight and Tanna Grentell equal second); U/15 boys Axel Fairfull (r/up

Cousins); U/15 girls Rori Urquhart (r/up Sosie Barton); U/16 boys Henry Knight (r/ up Nick Hodges); U/16 girls

Amara Bottom and Ashley Cousins; U/17&17+ boys Jayden Cryer (r/up Jayden Paul); U17&17+ girls (r/up Sophie Clark).

Henry Knight, Axel Fairfull, Nick Hodges, Harry Cousins, Taylah Wyllie and Ella Oborn have all qualified to compete at the Western Swimming Trials next month.

Competition was a help or hinder?

A bit of extra competition last weekend for the Yabbies at the Western Districts Carnival helped some members improve their times while it hindered others.

At last Tuesday night’s Cobar Yabbies Senior Men’s Swimming Club regular competition swim, a number of members were too fast which doesn’t help when the events are all handicapped.

There was no change however to Scott Toomey’s weekly routine as he finished spot on his nominated time to win the 50 metres handicapped freestyle event.

Murray Harland finished in second spot with 0.03 seconds off his nominated time and Bill Fugar was marginally behind in third place with 0.06 seconds off his time.

Harland was the closest to his time in the 100m swim after finishing within 0.53 seconds of his time.

Bob Clark (0.81) was second and Paul Swainston was further back in third place on 1.71.

Dave Mexted seemed to have no trouble backing up from his carnival swim wins and was an easy winner of the 30m event last Tuesday with 0.06 seconds off his time.

The next best recorded time was 0.31 seconds which was clocked by both John Carswell and Chris Powell, who tied for second place.

Toomey and Powell teamed up to win the Brace Relay novelty event which, last week, was to retrieve coins off the bottom of the pool.

The pair finished within 0.75 seconds of their nominated time.

Not far behind in second spot were Mexted and Swainston who completed the task within 0.90 seconds of their nominated time while Bill Fugar and Jason Toomey, with 1.82 off their time, were next best for third place.

’s swimming age champions and runners-up after last week’s annual school swimming carnival. Six of the group have qualified to go on to compete at the Western Swimming Trials next month.