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Kimura joins collegiate team in Saipan swim camp
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Posted on Apr 05 2016
Chukyo University swimmers gesture during a brief break in their training session at the Kan Pacific Swimming Pool last month. (Contributed Photo)
Tsunami Saipan Kensuke Kimura returned to the island last month to join his collegiate team for a training camp here.
Hiro Kimura, Kensuke’s father, said his son and 44 other members of the Chukyo University Swim Team were on Saipan for one week (from March 9 to 15) and trained at the Kan Pacific Swimming Pool. They held two training sessions every day with the morning workout held from 8am to 11am and the afternoon from 2pm to 5pm.
The visiting team held a special training on island to prepare for the Japan National Championships, which will take place late this month.
“This competition is also an Olympic trial. If a swimmer qualifies, he is selected as a member of Japan National Team. Many swimmers from Chukyo have strong chances of making it to the Olympics,” the older Kimura said.
Chukyo swimmers were with their head coach Koujyun Fijitani when they had the weeklong training camp, which will also help them prepare in intercollegiate tournaments in Japan. Chukyo won the Intercollegiate Swimming Championships in 2011 and 2013 and was runner-up in 2012, 2014, and 2015.
Chukyo, which is private university in Aichi Prefecture with campuses in Nagoya and Toyota, recruited Kensuke two years ago and he became a regular member of the squad last year.
“He is the backstroke swimmer of Chukyo. Kensuke’s personal best time now in the 100m backstroke if 58.02 seconds, which is already faster than the CNMI national record (1:02.67),” the Tsunami Saipan coach added.
Incidentally, Kensuke owns the CNMI national mark in the 100m backstroke, which he posted on May 20, 2014 during the 2014 Oceania Swimming Championships held at the West Wave Aquatic Centre in Auckland, New Zealand. The Chukyo member also holds the Commonwealth’s national records in the 50m backstroke (28.94 seconds) and 200m backstroke (2:18.04), which he made in the same Oceania tournament two years ago.
