Records set to tumble at Mayberry Swim Meet
Published:Friday | March 24, 2023 | 1:11 AMOrane Buchanan/Staff Reporter
The 25th staging of the Mayberry All-Island Swim Meet will take place today and tomorrow at the National Aquatics Centre with action set to start at 8 a.m. each day.
Immaculate Conception High and Campion College will seek to defend successfully the high school boys and girls’ titles, respectively, while Prep winners Hillel Academy and Excelsior in the primary section will take aim at repeating for their respective titles.
Following last year’s participation of just more than 700 swimmers, the 2023 staging will see a total of 1,005 participants with 523 high school participants and 482 preparatory and primary school representatives. Martin Lyn, president of the Aquatics Sports Association of Jamaica (ASAJ), believes it’s imperative to continue with the country’s largest swim meet which often brings out the best in the local swimmers.
“The Mayberry meet is always a fantastic meet as for some strange reason the swimmers seem to love the meet. This is one of the best sponsored meets and swimmers come out and seek qualifying times for Carifta, the Central American and Caribbean Games, Pan American Games as well as the Commonwealth Games,” Lyn said.
President Lyn also added that the competitive swim meet is important for the development of local swimmers as on each occasion, records and personal best times are established at the stadium pool.
“There’s never been a Mayberry meet where records haven’t been broken or have several best times swam by the athletes,” Lyn added.
SOLID FOUNDATION
Sable Joy-McLaren, group marketing manager of sponsors FirstRock Real Estate Investments Limited, said she foresees the partnership with the ASAJ as one that will continue for a very long time as meets such as these enable young athletes to build a solid foundation.
“This is very important for FirstRock as the values a meet like this will instil are directly aligned with ours at FirstRock as we always want to be at the front of the line in championing youth swimming or anything that can build students for the next level of their lives, inclusive of their career and journey,” said Joy-McLaren.
Desiree Wheeler, senior marketing officer with Mayberry Investments Limited, who donated a cheque valued at $650,000, believes the event will only get bigger as the annual growth is obvious.
“It’s been 25 years so we have been in this for a very long time. Mayberry has been championing the development of sports in Jamaica and swimming is particularly important to us as it is one of our flagship events, so it’s amazing to see the growth year after year, from 700-plus last year to over a 1,000 swimmers this year,” she said.