2 Tsunami Saipan swimmers set records

Tsunami Saipan’s Nanaka Watanabe, left, and Ashley Dangol are all smiles after completing a training session last week at the Kan Pacific Swimming Pool. (Contributed Photo)

Tsunami Swimming Center Saipan’s Ashley Dangol and Nanaka Watanabe posted CNMI age group records during the Tsunami Saipan Open held early this month at the Kan Pacific Swimming Pool.

Dangol earned record marks in two events in the girls 11 to 12 age group, while Watanabe made one in the same division.

The 11-year-old Dangol registered 10:30.99 in the lung-busting 800m freestyle event, breaking the record (10:51.15) of Saipan Swim Club’s Myana Welch. The age group mark in the 16-lap race stood for more than 16 years, as Welch logged the best time on Nov. 10, 2001.

Dangol’s time in the 800m freestyle was the fourth fastest among the eight swimmers who completed the event. Saipan Swim Club’s Kento Akimaru had the best time in the event after submitting 9:28.94.

The Tsunami Saipan swimmer’s other age group mark came in the 50m butterfly after she clocked in at 31.68 seconds. Dangol eclipsed the record (32.38 seconds) of former Tsunami Saipan bet Miku Tammy, who set the previous mark on March 21, 2014, and was the runaway winner in her age group. Tsunami Saipan’s Julia Jinang, Ashley Jeon, and Michelle Chen did the same race with the first two swimmers getting personal best times of 51.88 (from 52.47) and 55.76 seconds (from 1:10.68), respectively. Chen clocked in at 1:03.26.

Besides her record swims in the 800m and 50m butterfly, another highlight from Dangol’s performance in the Tsunami Open was her 400m freestyle event. According to coach Hiro Kimura, Dangol tallied a 5:15.71 in the eight-lap race and her time was a personal best (from 5:22. 84). Her mark is also not that far from the CNMI age group record of 5:12.09 (by Welch).

Meanwhile, Watanabe’s lone age group record in this month’s meet came from the 1,500m race.

The 12-year-old swimmer posted 20:54.97, surpassing another mark from Welch, who timed in at 21:10.55 on April 28, 2002.

Nanaka was one of the only three swimmers who did the longest event of the day and she was also the fastest, beating older sister Aika (21:17.54) and SSC’s Jinju Thompson (22:31.26).

Nanaka, Kimura noted, also did well in the 50m (39.88 seconds) and 100m (PB of 1:25.78) breaststroke events. She was just 0.38 of a second short of matching the age group record (1:25.40) of Welch in the 100m breaststroke.