BIG brother Tannah paved the way, but now it’s Macksville’s Millie Edwards turn to shine – and that she did at the Pacific School Games at Adelaide.
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The 10-year-old who trains with the Coffs Harbour Swimming Club, tackled a ginormous swimming program at the Games which attract some of Australia’s best athletes – as well as competitors from overseas.
In fact Millie’s program was so arduous that when faced with the prospect of swimming in three finals back-to-back, she had to shed the 50m back from the wish-list.
That left the Year 5 Macksville Public School student with just a staggering seven events – and the determined youngster made the final in all of them.
And Millie medalled in three of them: silver in the 200m individual medley (IM), and in the 100m fly, and bronze in the 200m IM relay.
The other four events also brought standout results: 4th in the 100m back, 5th in the 50m fly and 100m free and 9th in the 100m breast.
Millie told the Guardian it was her first time competing at the Pacific Games, but her second trip to Adelaide as she watched Tannah (also a quality swimmer) compete there the last time the event was held in South Australia.
“I was pretty thrilled with my results,” Millie said.
The times in the pool though came off the back of single-minded drive – leaving home at 4am each day for training at Coffs before school, then another session in the afternoon at the Macksville pool.
Millie’s next big assignment will be the Country Regional swimming meet at Port Macquarie on the Australia Day long weekend.
Related:
Incomparable to any other international school sport championship, the Pacific School Games provides opportunities for around 4000 school-aged students to participate in 11 different sports at the highest level. It is the flagship event of School Sport Australia, which provides educational opportunities for Australian and international students through the conducting of games in a range of sports.