2016 National Talent Identification Squad Camp

An Olympic theme took hold at the recent National Talent Identification Squad Camp at the AUT Millennium in Auckland.

The camp was an opportunity for the squad to come together, learn team values and culture that are essential to success and have a good old fashioned week of hard work in the pool and gymnasium.

Swimming New Zealand High Performance Athlete Development Coach Gary Hurring led the week before jetting off to Rio where he is head coach for the New Zealand team and said he was impressed with the attitude and skills shown throughout the week.

The group were also visited by teenage swim star Bobbi Gichard who came and spoke to them on her experiences at last year’s world championships and Commonwealth Youth Games. The other guest speaker for the week was Karma McGowan who presented from Drug Free Sport New Zealand.

Fitting in with the Olympic theme the squad had a lot of fun creating posters to inspire the Rio swim team at their farewell breakfast and also came along to wish them well and to ‘swim fast’.

The week concluded with the swimmers competing at the Auckland Short Course Championships where the focus was on racing with aggression and striving for personal best times.

Other staff at the camp included Swimming New Zealand’s Donna Bouzaid and Amy Dalzell and coaches Gennadiy Labara, Aimee Woodhead and Paul Dowey.

The National Talent Identification Squad can be found here.