Maitland's Valley Aquatic Club to host 2023 Coast and Valley Swimming Association Summer Championship

This is the third year in a row Valley Aquatic Club, which is based at Maitland pool, is hosting the event.

Nineteen clubs from Maitland, Dungog, Port Stephens, Cessnock, Singleton, Newcastle and the Central Coast are attending the competition, which is on from Friday, November 24 to Sunday, November 26.

It will draw not only the hundreds of competitors to Maitland, but their families as well.

Valley Aquatic Club president Luke Potts said it will be great to see so many athletes enjoying our local pool.

"It's very good to see so many of our local swimmers get to swim in their local pool, and from a Maitland town perspective it's great to see so many people coming into the area, spending the weekend in and around Maitland and utilising our wonderful facilities," he said.

This year's registration of 416 athletes is similar to the 2022 event, which had 444 competitors registered.

Last year 12 CVSA records were broken, including the record for the 11 years 200m freestyle which was broken by Valley Aquatic's Quin Neyland.

Valley Aquatic Club has 41 athletes competing, while other Maitland clubs East Maitland Olympic Amateur has one and Rutherford's Hunter Valley Allstars has five.

The largest cohort at the competition will be the University of Newcastle's NUSwim, which has 94 athletes registered.

Mr Potts said many Valley Aquatic swimmers will be looking at improving their times at the championship.

"We've got a number of swimmers who have already qualified for senior state in December, and they are looking to basically better their times," he said.

"We've got a lot of our junior swimmers qualified for or very close to qualifying for junior state age in March 2024, it's one of the first stepping stones for our representative pathways for our junior swimmers."

This is the last major carnival of the year that Valley Aquatic Club will host. The next will be Speedo Sprint Series in February 2024.

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