A Foothills Stingray standout continues to be on track to bigger and better things.
Sixteen-year-old Finlay Knox earned a spot in two finals and finished one-one-hundredth of a second shy of an on-track one time earmarked for potential Olympic medallists in a stirring performance at the Canadian Swimming and World Championship Trials last week in Victoria.
“I was really happy how I swam,” Knox said. “I knew what the (on-track) times were, but didn’t know them to the hundredths. When I saw my time I thought that must be pretty close to the time, to see I missed by one one-hundredths I thought ‘oh whatever, I can get it next week.”
Entering the competition with a pair of on-track two times established, the Grade 10 student at Foothills Composite was fractions of a second from the on-track one time which is tantamount to the time an Olympic medallist should be attaining at that stage of their development.
“It’s not something that’s on my mind all the time, it’s something that’s nice to get,” Knox said. “When you go into races and you’re racing other people you kind of have that edge that further down the line something cool could happen and if you keep trying it might get better.”
Knox added a 16th place finish in the 200m breaststroke and rounded out the competition as a 20th place finisher in the 400m IM.
“200 IM is definitely the one that stood out the most, but I got best times in all my events,” he said. “It was just being able to put in the stuff I do in practice and seeing it come up in the race, but also knowing that there are a lot more things I can improve on to drop my time even more.”
Knox, who took somewhat of a carefree approach to the competition, was far from in awe against the elite in Canadian swimming.
“He did everything I wanted him to,” said Stingrays head coach Todd Melton.
“He got the experience, he swam faster and he had the opportunity to final at the highest level only being 16 years old.
“At that meet there are no ages and everybody at that meet is at their best because that’s the one meet where they have to qualify. Nobody is safe, we saw a lot of upsets. It was pretty spectacular.”
Fellow Stingray Kennedy Loewen swam to a 25th place finish in the 100m backstroke while Megan Deering touched the wall with the 36th fastest time in the 100m breaststroke.
“The girls were going for the experience and the want to be back there and to use that as motivation moving forward in training,” Melton said.
“That’s exactly what they got. They also came away with that confidence so that next time they go they can do something special and at the very least final.”
DeWinton’s Justin Lisoway, a former member of the Stingrays now swimming with the Calgary Cascades, swam in four events at the trials and came away with a 12th place finish in the 50m backstroke.
The busy stretch continues for the Stingrays Performance group.
Foothills makes the trek to the Stampede City for the Western Canadian Championships April 20-23 at the Repsol Sport Centre.
For more information go to foothillsstingrays.com
