Diving into OFSAA 2018

By: Kylie Turner

High school students from all over Ontario were in Windsor for the Ontario Federation of School Athletic Associations (OFSAA) 2018 swim meet.

The OFSAA swim meet took place at the Windsor International Aquatic and Training Centre from Feb. 27 to 28.

There were various hotels with accommodations for OFSAA competitors coming from outside of Windsor to choose from including Caesars Windsor, Holiday Inn Downtown, Holiday Inn Express Downtown, Quality Inn & Suites and Towneplace Suites by Marriott. Other hotels offering accommodations were Comfort Inn & Suites, Hampton Inn & Suites and Holiday Inn Ambassador Bridge.

Danielle Parent is the WECSSAA & OFSAA Swim Convenor. She said this is not the first time Windsor has hosted the OFSAA swim meet.

“This is the third time in a row we have hosted OFSAA,” said Parent. “Me and my team bid on hosting it and got approval for two years in a row. Toronto was another city that bid for 2019 and 2020. No one took 2018, since we did two years in a row and we had fun with it we thought why not a third year.”

There were 18 different schools participating in swim events. There were events for senior and junior boys and junior and senior girls.

Junior events for OFSAA 2018 were 200m medley relay, 200m freestyle relay, 50m freestyle, 100m freestyle, 100m I.M., 50m fly, 50m back and 50m breast.

The senior events included 200m medley relay, 200m freestyle relay, 50m freestyle, 100m freestyle, 200m freestyle, 100m I.M., 50m fly, 100m back and 100m breast.

Open swimmers competed in 200m medley relay, 50m freestyle, 100m freestyle, 200m freestyle, 100m I.M., 200m I.M., 100m fly, 100m back, 100m breast and 400m freestyle relay. All para swimmers were scored with the FINA (Fédération Internationale de Natation) point system and participated in 50m freestyle, 100 freestyle and 50 back.

Students from Toronto, Sarah Arnott, Ava McDonald and Ella Darby participated in the 200 I.M. relay and came to Windsor from Toronto.

“We’re competitive swimmers so it was a chill meet because it was just for school,” said Darby.

For final results from this year’s competition you can find them online at  http://www.ofsaa.on.ca/swimming.