Reporting
from Middlebury College - 2009 NE LCM Championships:
Adirondack was represented by 12 masters swimmers at the weekend's
New England Masters Long Course Meters Championships in that superb
pool and aquatics center at Middlebury College, Vermont.
Our team scored a total of 308 points good enough for 3rd place out
of 22 non-NEM teams and, more important, 10th place among all 43 teams.
Hope Provencha was the leading scorer for ADMS with an excellent 42
points in six events. The youngest competitor in the entire meet, Hope
doubled in the 800m and the 1500m freestyle. Not to be outdone, Donna
Wadsworth also earned blue ribbons in the 800 and 1500.
Two ADMS quartets gained second place points with Taber, Hedderman,
Turecky and O'Shea giving their all in the mens' 400 freestyle relay
while Burke, Wadsworth, Bolster, and Provencha did likewise in the
womens 400 medley relay.
250 total swimmers participated in the three day meet in which over
forty New England records were broken, some several times and four
Canadian National Long Course records were also reduced to history.
The meet was beautifully managed by the Middlebury Muffintops' excellent
staff and student volunteers. The officials were all tolerant, efficient
and good humored.
It was a meet singularly devoid of hassles. Everything ran smoothly
and on time and there was plenty of opportunity for pleasant kibitzing
with our colleagues and opponents.
If you have never competed in this meet, you should know that quite
apart from the magnificently designed, spacious, airy and brightly
lit pool building, Middlebury itself is a most attractive New England
town straddling the broad waterfall and rapids of Otter Creek. There
are some lovely restaurants and coffee shops staffed by very friendly
and helpful young people. For the history and art buffs among you the
whole ensemble is a visual delight ranging from adaptively reused mills
to a splendid square flanked by the charming Middlebury Inn and a soaring
Georgian church. It is a pedestrian- friendly town, which serves as
a fitting terminus to a most pleasant drive on route 30 through rolling
farmland.
I have competed twice in 2007 and 2009. I would have been at the 2008
meet but my presence was essential at a 50th wedding anniversary at
an island castle in Ireland. I intend to enter again in 2010 and 2011,
if Middlebury continues to host the meet.
I encourage all Adirondackers to consider doing the same. It's a very
enjoyable experience and less than a 2-hour drive from Albany.
Stay wet, friends.
Patrick Quinn.
