April 2006 – Zoe wins New Zealand Swimmer of the year award for 2005
April has been a tough Month. After coming off the back of commonwealth Games I headed home for 1 week before leaving for China and the world Championships. No time for a break or rest really. However in saying that I arrived back in NZ with a sinus infection and severe cold. So I did a few workouts in the pool but mainly spent my week in bed trying to recover. I didn’t get any better for days so started a course of antibiotics a few days before my long haul flight to Shanghai.
Shanghai was interesting! Very different way of life and culture to what I know or have ever experienced before! Busy traffic, what seemed to be no road rules, but very entertaining to watch! The shopping was awesome and I think most of us came back with a few fake Prada bags, or fake designer watches!
The swimming was ok, but the set up wasn’t ideal. We had a very small warm down pool, only 4 lanes, and the warm ups and swim downs were packed. It was very difficult to prepare properly or have room to move most session. The competition was strong, and the heats were fast in my event. The 50 breaststroke was day 1 and I broke my own NZ record in the morning. The semi final were swam that evening and again I lowered the NZ record and qualified for the final comfortably. I was only 3 10th’s of a second off my personal best so all was looking good for the final the following evening. In the final I swam a very stupid swim, went out too fast in the first half of the race and during the final 10m of the race faded badly and only ended up finishing 6th overall. I was very disappointed with that.
After China, the NZ team headed home tired but not quite finished as we all had our 3rd and final competition to swim, the NZ Youth and Open Championships in my home town Christchurch. This meet also acted as the qualification meet for the Oceania Championships and Pan Pac’s later this year.
I swam on day 2 and 3 of this meet; I defended my National title comfortably, and made the Oceania team. I had made the decision I did not want to do the Pan Pac champs later in August due to the fact I want to take my annual break for 3 weeks during August so I am refreshed and ready to start a new season in my campaign to turn my 3 world bronze medals into this time a gold and attempt to get back a few of my world records.
After the New Zealand National competition had ended Zoe was prsented with the NZ swimmer of the year award for 2005 for her achievements at the 2005 World Championships in Montreal.
