McCarthy sets junior national record in butterfly

 TEAM PNG swimmer Tegan McCarthy set a new national record for the national under-17 category in the 50-metre butterfly  on Saturday in the 20th Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, Scotland.

Earlier in the week McCarthy equalled her personal best in the 100m butterfly in the Tollcross Swimming Centre.

McCarthy’s time for the 50m fly was 30.55s. 

Her personal best in 100m fly is 1.10.20 – which she equalled last week. Her efforts are some of the positive results obtained by Team Swimming in the first three days of competition.

On Saturday, Joycelyn Flynn obtained a personal best in the 200m breast stroke in a time of 3.08.06 – slicing off 4.5s from her best time.

Team manager Sarenah Pini said Saturday was a good day for the swimmers.

“The swimmers had the opportunity to swim in standard 50m pools here, unlike the 25m pools we train in in PNG where they have to make more turns,” Kelly said.

Pini said these games would be special for PNG female swimmers because they had the opportunity to do the relays, something they had not done in past Commonwealth Games.

Other notable achievements for Saturday were Barbara Vali-Skelton registering 2 minutes 54.39 seconds, a season’s best in the 200m breast stroke; Savannah Tkatchenko clocking a time of 31.79 in the 50m butterfly; Stanford Kawale registering a personal best of 55.09 in the 100m freestyle; and Colin Akara breaking his minute with a time of 59.18.

All swimmers are expected to represent the country at the Pacific Games in Port Moresby.