By Tamica Garnett

TWIN sisters Jadyn and Daniel George were Guyana’s top performing swimmers at this year’s Goodwill Swim Meet. Guyana collected a total of 15 medals and finished with 373 points to end in sixth position at the meet which concluded last Sunday at the Rodney Heights Aquatic Centre in St Lucia.
Jadyn and Daniel ended with three gold and three silver medals, respectively. Jadyn was the only swimmer on Guyana’s team of 29 swimmers to win a gold medal at the regional event, in which teams from Suriname, Barbados, Trinidad, St Lucia, and the Bahamas also participated.
The ultimate team win once again went to Trinidad and Tobago, who amassed 1 397 points to defend their title. In an almost exact repeat of last year’s placing Suriname once again came in second, ending with 1 080 points this year. Barbados again finished third, after assembling 721 points, and St Lucia were in for fourth, with 635 points.
The only change in this year’s results was that Bahamas moved up to finish fifth, having 566 points, while the Guyana team returned to the cellar position.
The other medal-takers on the Guyana team were Phillip DeNobrega, Ariel Rodrigues, Reakwon Noel, Nathan Hackett, and Kenita Mahaica.
Jadyn won Guyana’s first gold on Friday, when the competition began, in the Girls 11-12 100m freestyle, where she clocked 1:05.25s for the win. Danielle was just on her heels clocking 1:06.12s to take the silver.
The pair were back at it again on Saturday for the gold and silver in the 50m freestyle, with Jadyn finishing in a time of 29.69 seconds and Danielle touching the wall in 30.21 seconds.
On Sunday they challenged each other in the 200m freestyle, closing off their medal earnings by finishing in 2;21.58s for gold and 2:26.88s for silver.
On the Boys side, Phillip DeNobrega started off with silver in the Boys’ 15-17 100m freestyle, ending the race in 56.74 seconds. On the same day he put forward a time of 1:04.06s in the 100m backstroke, which was just enough to get him the bronze medal in that event.
As the competition continued he managed a bronze in the 50m butterfly with a performance of 28.07 seconds, before he ended with silver in his 200m freestyle (2:05.81s).
After shining brightly in the Girls’ 8-and-under category last year, multiple gold medallist Aleka Persaud fell from grace as she took on a new age category this year. She could only muster a single bronze medal performance in the Girls’ 9-10 50m butterfly with a time of 33.67 seconds.
This year’s 8-and-under girl, Ariel Rodrigues, saw herself claim a bronze medal off her 42.18 seconds’ swim in the 50m butterfly of her category.
Kenita Mahaica took bronze in the Girls’ 13-14 50m backstroke (35.02s), Raekwon Noel won bronze in the Boys’ 9-10 50m butterfly (32.52s). in the Boys’ 13-14 category Nathan Hackett clocked 30.77 seconds to take a bronze in the 50m backstroke.