A total of seven local records were broken by swimmers at the just-completed Winter Age Groups held over the weekend at the Bermuda Amateur Swimming Association pool facility.

The championship meet featured over 100 male and female swimmers in five different age groups, in two sessions spread over the Friday and Saturday nights.

The top performance of the meet was Jason Mastalir?s (Sharks Swim Club) swim in the 1,500 metres freestyle as he broke both the age group and senior records. Entering the meet with a seed time of 17:42.10, Jason tore an astonishing 50 seconds off of this, as he completed the gruelling race in 16:52.28. This eclipsed the previous age group record, held by Olympian Stephen Fahy, by 26 seconds. It is worth noting that Jason is only 15 and it is a distinction to be also the holder of the senior record at so young an age.

In the same race, Benedict Parfitt (Dolphins Swim Team) broke his own 11 and 12 age group record by over a minute in a swim of equal merit, finishing in 22:11.01.

All of the other records also went to the 11 and 12 age group, as a young crop of up and coming swimmers continues to shine. Ashley Yearwood (Harbour Swim Club) set three records in the meet; the first was in the girl?s 400 metres individual medley with a great individual effort. Her second record came in the 200 butterfly, as she stripped two seconds off of her previous mark. But it was in the 100 butterfly where she turned in her best personal performance of the meet, improving by nearly six seconds, with a swim of 1:15.65.

The record count was rounded out by the rapidly improving Nick Patterson (Sharks Swim Club) as he established a new record in the boys 11 and 12 age group 200 butterfly, stripping three seconds from the previous record held by Stephen Kenny. Several swimmers swept all five of their races to score the maximum number of points in the High Points Awards and these were: Somer Froud (Harbour), Molly Pilgrim (Harbour), Ashley Yearwood (Harbour), Nicholas Patterson (Sharks), Kellan DeSilva (Sharks) and Jason Mastalir (Sharks).

The competitive season restarts in the new year, with the first of the Spring Series, as swimmers will attempt to meet the standards for representation in a number of planned overseas competitions.