As a warm-up of sorts for the Canada Games, Krystal Shaw went to the Can-Am Para Swimming Competition recently to simply get some practice in.
But she's not complaining about winning a silver medal, either.
The local Swimmer With A Disability (SWAD) athlete picked up the second place finish in the 50-m breaststroke event.
"The competition was awesome. Krystal took off lots of time," said coach Monty Smith. "In the 50m breaststroke where she got her silver, she took off eight seconds. In a 50m, that's lots."
Shaw herself was pleased with her performance, especially since the groupings were based not on age but on relative disability.
"I think I did pretty good. Wasn't expecting that," said the 15-year-old.
"Everyone's so much older than me and they've trained longer than me."
With the Canada Games kicking off at the end of this week, Shaw is gearing up her practices and trying to focus on her goals for the national competition in Charlottetown. To that end, the Can-Am event gave Shaw the chance to experience being away from home and trying to focus on swimming with all the pressures of a major competition swirling around.
For more, read Friday's Times-Herald.
