swimming….IGLA 2007

May 24-27……Paris, France

Swimming saw 608 participants, representing 65 different teams, from 19 different countries. Athletes ranged in age from 18 to 78 and over the course of four days multiple IGLA Championship swimming records were set.

Individually, there were a 16 swimmers who walked away with a clean sweep of five gold medals. For the women they were Debbie Cavanaugh of Team Florida, Flore Tirraz of Paris Aquatique, Andrea Thresh of the Long Beach Grunions and Christina West of the District of Columbia Aquatic Club. On the men’s side, Cav Cavanaugh of Team Florida, Robert Davie of the Long Beach Grunions, Alex Davis of Out to Swim London, Michael Dively from Team Florida, Paulo Figueiredo of West Hollywood Aquatics, John Grzeszczak of Team Florida, Brian Jacobson of Minnesota Ice, Gene Kennedy of Boston LANES, John Kiley of Team New York Aquatics, Andre Nussbaumer of Gay Sport Zurich, Craig Pickering of KY Liquid and Peter Westeel of Aulnay-Sous-Bois S.N..

This year’s team competition crowned new victors in the Large, Medium and Small team categories. In Large Team, Team Florida and District of Columbia Aquatics were neck and neck over the four day competition, but Team Florida pulled out the win on the last day, ending DCAC’s four year winning streak. Paris Aquatique came in third in Large Team rankings. In the Medium Team category, the Long Beach Grunions were victorious, followed by West Hollywood Aquatics and Team New York Aquatics. In the small team race, the Atlanta Rainbow Trout came out on top, with A’Contre Courant Montreal in second and Minnesota Ice in third.

The 2007 winners of the Rick Meier-Windes Memorial award for recognition of excellence in distance swimming saw ties in both the women’s and men’s categories. For the women Michelle Girard, of Paris Aquatique and Barbra McGregor of Team Florida were recognized for excellence in distance swimming. For the men it was Craig Pickering of Kentucky KY Liquid, and Andre Nussbaumer of Gay Sport Zurich.