SWIMMING: Rising young swimming star Jacob Smith has shone the spotlight on his town, club and school after medalling at the National All-Schools championships in Brisbane this week.
The St Xavier’s student kicked off a highly successful meet with a bronze medal in the 100m backstroke, followed by a silver in the 50m event.
Jacob added relay gold to his swag with a win in the 200m medley event where he swam the backstroke leg and gave the NSW team a handy lead.
This was followed by another gold in the 4×50 freestyle relay, where Jacob registered a personal best time of 28.26 seconds after earlier stopping the clock at 28.49 seconds in the individual 50m freestyle, where he missed a finals berth by .03.
In the 200m individual medley, the speedster finished fourth in Australia and fifth in the 100m freestyle, which augers well for his future.
Coach John Hickey was one of three NSW coaches on deck at the titles, with a former Gunnedah swim coach and St Xavier’s school teacher Tony Kokegei one of the NSW team managers.
Jacob has worked hard for his success, competing at school, diocesan, inter-diocesan level and PSSA before gaining selection in the NSW team for the national titles.
With personal best times in every event, Jacob’s support team has applauded the youngster who they said had “competed like a professional and acted like a professional every minute of the carnival”.
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