Falkirk Otter swimmers impress at various meets

Several Otter swimmers swam under the FIRST banner at the National Age Group Championships with Lexine McCappin leading the way by claiming a fantastic bronze medal in the girls 17-18 years 1500m freestyle event.

This is a great achievement and one that will inspire many of the younger Otter swimmers at the club. Lexine had a great meet and also made finals in the 400m free, the 200m fly and narrowly missed out on another medal by coming 4th in the 400m IM.

The Otter's were well represented across the age groups with Zoe Crawford again putting in some fantastic performances and narrowly missing out on a medal in the 50m butterfly by finishing 4th.

Zoe also demonstrated her talent across many events by making finals in the 50m, 100m and 200m back and the 100m fly. Victoria Weir capped off an excellent week in Aberdeen by making the final of the 100m breastroke with Grace Blair just missing out on the final of the 100m breastroke at her first national event.

Finlay Byrne, Orla Campbell, Zachary Dormer, Keziah McCappin, Ewan McMahon, Emma Silcock, Ava Steele and Ruaraidh Stevenson completed the team of Otters representing FIRST at Aberdeen.

Grace Blair and Lexine McCappin continued their excellent form into the East Kilbride Long Course Meet by winning a number of medals. Grace made a clean sweep of the breastroke events by winning gold medals across the 50m, 100m and 200m distances whilst her FIRST teammate Lexine picked up golds in the 400m IM and the 200m breastroke and silver in the 200m backstroke.

Lexine's sister Keziah also won a bronze medal in the 100m breastroke and placed 4th in the 50m breastroke. Ava Steele won a bronze medal in the 200m backstroke and showed her talents across the strokes by just missing out on medals in her other events.

Ruaraidh Stevenson completed the Otter's medalists by winning silver in the 200m fly. The squad was completed by Sara Aitken, Finlay Byrne, Grace Cooper, Zachary Dormer, Ava Gallacher, Aniston Lindsay, Isla MacKenzie, Meghan McLaughlin and Mia Taylor who all swam well with many making personal bests.

Meanwhile, a team of younger Otters competed at Glenrothes last week at the Dunfermline Junior Sprints meet. There were many impressive swims throughout the day in a team that comprised Lily Taylor, Callum Reid, Aria Meney, Matthew Byrne, Zachary Dormer, Jessica Fletcher, Thea Godding, Zara Gibson, Niamh Hopkins, Kai Johnstone, Euan MacKenzie, Kyle Rawding, Lily E Taylor, Lucy Ure, James Weir and Edward Watson.

Young Lily Taylor led the charge in the morning session by winning gold in the 25m fly. In the afternoon, medalists included both Zachary Dormer and Kyle Rawding with Zachary winning golds in all of his events (100m IM, 50m back, 50m breastroke, 50m fly and 50m free) and Kyle winning silver in 50m back and 50m breastroke and bronze in 100m IM and 50m free. Zachary capped off an impressive performance by winning top boy in his age group with strength and depth showing through Kyle coming 2nd. A great meet was finished off by both relay teams performing well with the team comprising Zachary, Jessica, Lucy and Kyle winning an excellent silver.