Stroke like a butterfly, swim like a fish

FOR Arabella Chapman, swimming just started as a fun pastime, but in the three short years she’s been competing she has already notched up an impressive aquatic resume. The nine year old Myrtleford Swim Club member started swimming in competitions when she was just six years old, and loves it. “When I started it was just for fun,” Arabella said. “But then when I got in races, I actually really liked them. “Butterfly’s my first best stroke but backstroke’s my least – I hate it. “The first one I did I was very nervous - we were at Corryong.” Arabella’s mother Bridget Flint-Chapman explained it was an encouragement race doing butterfly, just to see how the swimmers went without the fear of disqualification from incorrectly performing the difficult stroke. “She pretty much swam the whole lap butterfly,” Flint-Chapman said. “Butterfly and breast stroke are her best strokes, most people are the opposite. “A lot of races, she’s the only one in it for butterfly, but you still have to win it and qualify to go to Melbourne. “They take the top nine from Ovens and Murray to the All Juniors finals. “Arabella qualified for butterfly, breast stroke and freestyle, and when she went there she came second in butterfly and third in breaststroke.” The All Juniors finals were held back in March at the Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre and for Arabella, it was the biggest meet she had competed in. “That was really big, it’s a big pool, and I was very nervous,” Arabella said. “It was very cold when I did my butterfly race, my toes were shivering. “But when I got in the water, I just swam - it’s kind of warm in the water. “Butterfly is really fun, it makes me feel like a dolphin.” With club records in her pet events and accolades locally, regionally and statewide, Arabella’s swimming journey is just getting started. She is still hard at work honing her craft with her eyes on one day representing Australia at the Olympics. “She’s joined the Wangaratta Stingrays for winter to keep her going - she’s part of the Myrtleford Swim Club for summer but then over winter when our pool closes she’s been heading over to Wangaratta two or three times a week,” Flint-Chapman said. “She’s done amazingly, with no swimming last year she kept training. “We’ve had two very disrupted years with COVID and bushfires, and the 2019 season was shut because of the pool being shut. “We put a pool in last March, and I think that’s really when she got confident in her butterfly.” No matter what events Arabella enters in the future, she’s confident she will have fun and continue to develop as a swimmer. “I’m very proud of myself, I just like swimming,” she said.

Stroke like a butterfly, swim like a fish

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