EMPIRE GAMES

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVIII, Issue 19953, 10 November 1934, Page 16

EMPIRE GAMES

NEW ZEALAND SWIMMERS Reporting on the performances of the New Zealand swimmers at the Empire Games, Dr. A. E. Porritt (who had charge of the team) stated:— “The swimmers were introduced to Mr W. J. Howcroft on the night of their arrival. Mr Howcroft is one of the premier swimming coaches in England, and it was at the suggestion of Mr Hodgson (representative of the N.Z.A.S.A. in England) that I arranged for his services—which, incidentally, were given gratis. Before the team's arrival Mr Hodgson and I had arranged that two pools should be available for the use of the swimmers—one near at hand at St. Mary’s Hospital (a very modern and well-equipped though rather small bath) and one some distance out in Epping Forest (the King-

fisher’s Pool, set in very beautiful surroundings in the forest; a full-sized bath and with full club facilities attached). For the first ten days after arrival training was carried out twice per day in one of these pools, after which the Wembley pool itself was opened for training purposes. During the first week the swimmers all showed very good form, and Mr Howcroft was most optimistic; but again the process of acclimatisation, combined with very sultry weather, took its toll, and trials held about a week before the Games

were disappointing, except, perhaps, in the case of Crump. At a final trial held some days later even he had fallen off. Mr Howcroft’s many duties unfortunately prevented him being with the swimmers as much as I should have liked, but his advice was extremely valuable; and neither to this nor to any lack of hard and conscientious training on the part of the boys could one attribute subsequent disappointments. “The same applied to them as to the whole team—a point which I wish to stress most definitely—that their period of acclimatisation was too short,

and they were not helped either by their long boat trip (on which, unlike both the Australians and the South Africans, they were unable to get ashore for a normal work-out), or by the very hot and enervating weather with which London greeted them.”