Club Warriors kicked off the 2023 Winter Championship Season on February 16th on opening day of Ontario Youth-Junior Championships. Congratulations to all 15 swimmers from our Elite and Junior Elite teams who travelled to the Etobicoke Olympium to compete in this 18 & Under championship event. For many, the goal was to better their lifetime bests and, for some, to qualify for the upcoming provincial and national meets in March. We are happy to report that our Warriors did not disappoint.

Assistant Head Coach, Connor Watson remarked, "It was an exhilarating weekend of racing for our CW swimmers! Despite not being ideal championship meet conditions, we did a remarkable job standing up on the blocks and taking advantage of every opportunity we had - from moving up in their rankings to claiming a significant amount of medals to taking off time, everyone did their part for the team."

Club Warriors placed 6th in combined scoring out of over 70 participating clubs and took home 10 Gold and 5 Silver medals!. Congratulations also to Andrei Ciorogariu who was crowned the Boys 16-18 High Point Winner of the meet and to Sarah Coffin who was the highest points scorer for CW. Way to go, Warriors!

 

Here are highlights of this exciting 4-day event:

DAY 1

CW was off to a solid start on Day 1 of the OYJs. Owen Inglis led the evening with a spectacular Silver medal finish in the 200-m Breaststroke. His time of 2:39.77 earned him a spot in both the upcoming Ontario (OSC) and Eastern Canadian Swimming Championships. Sarah Coffin also had a fantastic first day. She was seeded 12th in the 50-m Freestyle and 17th in the 200-m Breaststroke but, with strong, hard-fought swims in the prelims and finals, she succeeded in claiming 5th in both events. Congratulations also to finalists, Tara Wong and Rodrigo Oviedo, on their 7th and 8th place finishes, respectively.

Highlights

Owen Inglis – SILVER 200BR (OSC & Easterns qual.)

Sarah Coffin – 5th 50FR, 5th 200BR

Tara Wong – 7th 100FR

Rodrigo Oviedo – 8th 50FR

PBs – Mackenna Riel, Ethan Litschgy, Camilla Oviedo, Spencer Pirvu, Alan Salah

 

DAY 2

Our Warriors were on fire today securing 8 individual finals and 7 podiums! Rodrigo Oviedo started the evening by crushing his entry time by over 4s in the 200-m Freestyle. He clocked in at 2:06.92 and earned his first Eastern Nationals and Long Course OSC qualifying time en route to winning a Silver medal. Andrei Ciorogariu would follow with an impressive Gold medal performance in the 200-m Freestyle with a personal best time of 2:00.99.

Sarah Coffin and Connor Brown had us on our feet with their Gold medal wins in the 400 IM. Connor will join CW’s growing team of qualifiers at the Canadian Juniors this summer with his time of 5:03.25 while Sarah dropped a whopping 11.14s off her entry time, clocking in at 5:26.31 — only 1.27s off the OSC standard. Moments later, Sarah would wow us again with her 100-m Butterfly win at the OSC-qualifying pace of 1:07.95 — only .15s short of the Eastern National standards!

CW’s 6th medal came from Luc Landry who swam a personal best time of 59.40 to bring home Silver in the 100-m Butterfly. Luc closed off the evening with teammates, Ethan Litschgy, Hercules Cheng and Andrei Ciorogariu, by adding another Gold to CW's medal haul in the 15 & Over Men’s 4x100-m Freestyle Relay. Their incredibly fast time of 3:44.31 made the CJC qualifying standards. Way to go, team!

Highlights

Sarah Coffin – GOLD 400IM, GOLD 100FL (OSC qual.)

Connor Brown – GOLD 400IM (CJC qual.) , 7th 100FL

Luc Landry – SILVER 100FL, Finalist 200FR

Andrei Ciorogariu – GOLD 200FR

Rodrigo Oviedo – SILVER 200FR (OSC & Easterns qual.)

Boys 15&Over 4x100-m Free Relay GOLD (CJC qual.) – Ethan Litschgy, Hercules Cheng, Luc Landry, Andrei Ciorogariu

PBs – Simon Poeluev, Ethan Litschgy

 

DAY 3

CW continued their success in the pool today with 7 swimmers making finals and adding 3 more to our medal haul.

In the 100-m Freestyle event, Andrei Ciorogariu shaved .97s off his entry time and picked up his second Gold medal of the meet. Meanwhile, 8th-seeded Rodrigo Oviedo dropped 1.17s to take 5th place while Tara Wong claimed 8th.

The 200-m Butterfly races featured a couple of exciting showdowns. The 14-year-old boys shot out of the gate fast, but Connor Brown remained calm and steady and, in the end, edged out a MAC swimmer to take Silver. He clocked in at 2:25.09 and added the 200 Fly to his OSC events. Also looking incredibly relaxed during his finals was 15-year-old Simon Poeluev who dropped almost 9s off his entry time to capture 5th in the 200 Fly! For Luc Landry, it was a two-way battle between him and a GHAC swimmer for the first 150 meters but, after the final turn, Luc comfortably broke away and captured GOLD. His time of 2:13.12 adds the 200 Fly to his Eastern Nationals events and is just .27s shy of the OSC cut.

Shoutout also to our final individual swimmer of the evening — Owen Inglis was seeded 12th in the 100-m Breaststroke but swam his prelim race beautifully to make it into the finals where he finished 8th.

Our 15 & Over 4x50-m Freestyle Relay team capped the evening with an exciting race. After being narrowly edged out by the GHAC team, we thought Simon Poeluev, Hercules Cheng, Luc Landry and Andrei Ciorogariu succeeded in bringing home the Bronze but ended up 4th overall due the TSC team winning the morning session with a better time. It was exciting to watch nonetheless and a proud moment for CW.

Highlights

Andrei Ciorogariu – GOLD 100FR

Luc Landry – GOLD 200FL (Easterns qual.)

Connor Brown – SILVER 200FL (OSC qual.)

Simon Poeluev – 5th 200FL

Rodrigo Oviedo – 5th 100FR

Tara Wong – 8th 100FR

Owen Inglis – 8th 100BR

15 & Over 4x50-m Freestyle Relay 4th – Simon Poeluev, Hercules Cheng, Luc Landry and Andrei Ciorogariu

PB – Mackenna Riel

 

DAY 4

It was 4 for 4 on the final night of the OYJs with all our finalists making a trip to the podium!

Sarah Coffin started things off by claiming her 3rd Gold medal, this time in the 200 IM with a personal best time of 2:34.31. She led the race from the beginning with her powerful fly and remained ahead of the pack until the very end. Way to go, Sarah!

Connor Brown followed with his own Gold medal in the 200 IM. It was a thrilling race with the lead being exchanged between 3 other swimmers at each turn, but it was Connor who came out on top with a strong freestyle push in the last 50 meters as he edged out the KBM swimmer at the wall. His time of 2:24.50 was a mere .05s short of the OSC cut!

Coming into the meet as the 11th seed, Simon Poeluev fought hard for a spot in the finals of the 200-m Backstroke and then continued on his impressive journey to come home with a Silver medal! Simon dropped 2.64s off his entry time and his time of 2:21.44 came to within 1.24s of making the OSC cut.

CW’s final race of the meet, the 16-18 Boys 400-m Freestyle, proved to be a nail-biter. Andrei Ciorogariu was in a tight 3-way race after the first 100 meters, but Andrei finished strong and out-touched the other swimmers to collect his 3rd Gold of the meet!

Highlights

Sarah Coffin – GOLD 200IM

Connor Brown – GOLD 200IM

Simon Poeluev – SILVER  200BK

Andrei Ciorogariu – GOLD 400FR

 

A massive thank you to Coach Connor for leading our 15 Warriors to an amazing start to the Winter Championship Season and to all parents supporting our team this holiday long weekend, including braving some icy driving conditions on Thursday night and Friday in order to get our swimmers to the pool.

Also taking place this weekend was the 13 & Under Ontario Festival SC Champioships – stay tuned for that meet report. Next up for Club Warriors is the Western Ontario Region SC Championships where we will see a large contingent of our younger age-group swimmers compete beginning this Thursday, February 23rd.

 

---

For full results, visit the SwimRankings.net website.

---