Oxford Bayley and Abbey Smale are on target for the 5km Banana Boat swim in Akaroa on Saturday, the event doubling as the regional secondary schools championships.
Oxford had the normal battle with Hayden Squance, taking out the win by two seconds, while Abbey was placed third ahead of Ben Marshall and old geezer Hamish Neill (57).
The 1650m course took swimmers across to the dolphin, down to the pirate boat off Haulashore Island, then back to the green boat moored off Rocks Rd before heading back against the slight current to the finish at the yacht club ramp.
Lucy Barron headed off Christina Harris around the last buoy, the pair taking second and third women’s spots.
In the short swim over more than 700m, Emily Chadderton pulled the normal rabbit out of the hat to pip Noah Brehaut by two seconds, ahead of Lilly Claridge and Tony Munnerly.
Note that the positions in each division are now being calculated on the best 11 performances (in the final column of the points table). If you’ve done more than 11 swims, your worst performances will be dropped off.