| Congratulations to the 2019 season swim award recipients who were celebrated at the OMSC end of year event in June. Here is a list of the winners. Be sure to check out their plaques in the trophy display case at the H2O. Most Inspirational Swimmer: Carol Taylor
OMSC would like to recognize Carol’s many contributions to the club. She is always a friendly face on deck and demonstrates dedication to both swimming and our club. At practice she is everyone’s cheerleader and won’t let her swim mates get away with putting anything less than their best effort. She motivates her fellow swimmers through positive feedback, humour and her own displayed dedication. Carol contributed four years to the OMSC Board as the Coach Liaison. She was a strong, constant and always positive link from the Board to the coaches (and back). Carol is a fierce competitor and always strives to improve. She attends swim meets to challenge herself (including 2018 Nationals) and encourages others to challenge themselves in the same way. Volunteer of the Year: Brenda Balderson
OMSC would like to recognize Brenda as our current “super-volunteer”. Brenda came onto the OMSC Board shortly after joining the club. As a seasoned Chartered Accountant, she was able to tighten up our accounting procedures and create templates that will be able to be used into the future – the ones we use for negotiating our YMCA annual contract are especially important.
She has been instrumental in helping us improve our contracts, policies, bylaws and created a Financial Guidelines document that will help all future Treasurers. Brenda also volunteers and attends our social activities and shows up at all swim meets – if it is a Masters meet then she is swimming! If it is a KAJ meet, then she is timing. Brenda stepped down from the OMSC Board after four years and THEN volunteered to continue to be our bookkeeper to help transition the current Treasurer. Most Improved Female Swimmer: Jasmine Neville
Jasmine Neville attends practices consistently 3-5 times a week and she always gives her best efforts and attitudes at every swim session she attends. When Jasmine first joined the club two years ago, she was the at the very end of her lane, usually just making pace times (touch and go sets). Jasmine never complained about pace times or practices being “too hard”, and she always rose to the challenge to make the sets as best as she could. Because of her overly determined personality and ability to endure hard practices, Jasmine is now the leader of her lane and pushes her teammates to work hard and push themselves as well. Jasmine has successfully completed her first half-iron man with a very impressive swim time. We look forward to what your future in our club will look like Jasmine! Keep up the amazing work Most Improved Male Swimmer: Jon Ridinger
Jon Ridinger came to our club two years ago with the goal to improve his fitness and endurance abilities. Although his goals are similar today, he has more ambitious goals to improve his Across the Lake swim time and compete in some triathlons in the summer. Jon began swimming at the back of his lane in his group, but quickly became the leader of the lane. Jon consistently follows paces times and consistently tries his hardest at every single practice, which he attends consistently 3-4 times a week in addition to biking and other outdoor activities. In addition to Jon’s freestyle endurance improvements, he has also excelled in other strokes; particularly his butterfly. John understands that in order to get better at butterfly, you must “train butterfly”… so when given the choice in a hard set, John will still choose to swim butterfly, even though it is the most challenging stroke choice to commit to during most sets. John’s mental toughness and determination has made him a very strong and skillful butterfly-er in our club. We look forward to what the future of master swim club has to offer you Jon! Swimmer of the Year: Debra Parker
Debra always shows up to practice with a smile and her attitude is contagious. If you do not know her she will most likely make a point of introducing herself to you. She swims 5-6 times a week, loves to compete and contribute to points earned for our club, and has achieved personal bests this season. She participated in both Provincials and Nationals with notable rankings, came in 2nd in her age group at the 2018 Across the Lake Swim, and finished 3rd in her age group at the 2018 Rattle Snake Island Swim. Debra had a double hip replacement, but that did not slow her down. After a fairly short recovery time, she completed her 2nd million metre challenge (in under two years!). The coaches have described her as a super fast swimmer and an asset to our club. Community Volunteer: James Pengilly OMSC regularly recognizes an individual connected to OMSC through the swimming community. This year we recognize James Pengilly, the KAJ Volunteer Coordinator on the KAJ Board and responsible for organizing volunteers for the KAJ meets. James is unfailing polite, incredible organized and an excellent communicator – all wonderful attributes for his role. He not only reaches out to OMSC to help fill roles at the KAJ meets, but he helps us find volunteers for our meets from within KAJ. We have become a much closer, more cooperative “swim family” while James has been in this role. With this award, OMSC recognizes how hard James works at this volunteer role. Hammer Award: Cailla Paterson Cailla wondered if she deserved OMSC’s Hammer Award so we’ll provide a little background. In her 20th race at the Ironman distance, Cailla won the women’s 45-49 division at 2018 Ironman Canada by more than 45 minutes in scorching conditions. These were her comments after the event to Kelowna Now.
“I got off the bike in a great position and from there it was surprisingly easy and fun,” said Patterson. “It’s not in my nature to pull back at all, when I get to the run, I usually hammer it. But I had a bit of an injury I wanted to look after, so I didn’t hammer it down this time and just really enjoyed the moment. When I was finished, I was super happy.”
Being tough as nails, ‘hammering it out’ is Cailla’s philosophy for most of her swim sessions. Except when she is working on stroke or has an injury which is not that often. So Cailla, congratulations with being our very worthy winner of the very prestigious 2019 OMSC Hammer Award. And remember to take more than ten seconds rest when swimming is not a bad thing. Elena Dimitrov Award for Courage and Determination: no nominations | 
