When Connor Roberts sat down with Tamworth City coach Nicolas Monet and mapped out a plan for their assault on next year’s Australian Age Swimming Championships, they didn’t envisage that by years end he would be a state champion.
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The recent senior state age championships were more, as Monet put it, a checking point on their journey.
They didn’t go in expecting medals. Roberts was just hoping to make a few finals, and swim a few nationals qualifying times.
He well and truly eclipsed that, besting his personal best time nearly every swim, achieving nationals times in six of his nine events, and winning gold in the 16-years 200m individual medley, silver in the 100m backstroke, and bronze in the 200m backstroke and 400m individual medley.
Feeling good heading in, he even surprised himself with how well he swum.
“I knew I’d swim some big pb’s but not that big,” he said, adding that they didn’t even taper.
In both the 200m and 400m medleys he shaved around eight seconds off his pb.
That was what Roberts derived the most satisfaction from – the times, the medals were just a bonus.
It has him excited for the nationals, which will be held in Adelaide in April.
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There is a lot of hard work, and kilometres, to be done between now and then, but Roberts doesn’t shy away from that.
“I love hard work. I live for it. I get so excited to go to training,” he said.
After turning 17 last Friday, Roberts will step up an age division for the nationals, but will do so in the knowledge that his times were equatable with the top 17-year-olds at the state championships.
Ironically it was a disappointing performance at this year’s nationals that has sparked Roberts’ ambitions.
“I swam so terribly I said I don’t want to do this again,” Roberts said.
“I said I want to have a plan.”
So he and Monet devised one, working on building up his strength and his aerobic base.
Swimming only three times a week before then, he regularly clocks up 60km a week.
He credited that hard work to his success in Sydney.
“There’s no compromise for hard work. You have to put in the ks (kilometres) in swimming to be up there,” he said, adding that he is “so happy” to have Monet.
“He’s so great and he has so much experience.”
He joked he was probably more excited than him down in Sydney.
“I could see him in the freestyle in the IM – he was chasing me up the pool,” he said.
After a couple of weeks break Roberts will hit the water for the Tamworth City carnival on January 5.
“It will be so great. Our carnival is so fun each year,” he said.
Roberts and Monet are also tossing up competing at the state open championships, which Roberts said will “be another opportunity to step into the next level of competition”.
