Gee-Gees second at RSEQ Championships, win record 38 medals

March 10, 2022

The Gee-Gees swimming team established a new program best at the 2022 RSEQ Swimming Championships, winning a combined 38 medals en route to an overall second place finish. The championships were hosted at Montpetit Hall, with McGill claiming the overall conference championship.

The Gee-Gees will send 29 representatives to the 2022 U SPORTS National Championships, which will take place March 24-26 at Université Laval.

The Gee-Gees medal haul included seven gold, 14 silver, and 17 bronze, with ten medals coming in relay events. Overall, 27 members of the Garnet and Grey stepped onto the podium at least once during the three-day competition.

Malorie Kanaan was named the winner of the RSEQ Leadership and Community Engagement award and the team had 23 RSEQ All-Star selections, including nine to the first team.

An Ottawa swimmer won a medal in the first ten straight events of the championships, and the team continued the momentum throughout the weekend.

GOLD MEDAL PERFORMANCES:

Nathan Schiffmann claimed the first gold medal of the championships for uOttawa with a dominant performance in the 1500 metre freestyle, winning the event by over eight seconds. The Gee-Gees men's 400-metre medley relay team followed up two events later with the second gold of Day One as Ryan Jensen, Hugo Lemesle, Alexandre Perreault, and Allen Zheng teamed up for the victory.

Friday's finals saw Brendan Van Herk take the gold medal in the 400-metre individual medley – the first conference medal for the former Regina Cougar. Will Barrett defended his RSEQ gold medal from 2020 by winning the 100m breaststroke, in what was almost an Ottawa podium sweep as Hugo Lemesle took the silver and Noah Wagner narrowly missed out on bronze to take fourth place.

Adelle Yamashita-Ball captured the 400m freestyle gold medal to start off Saturday's finals, winning by over two seconds. In the 200-metre breaststroke events the Gee-Gees had two medallists in both the men's and women's events, with Lauren Shearer and Lemesle winning the gold.

List of Gee-Gees Medallists (for event details, view the list here):

Hugo Lemesle: 2 gold, 3 silver

Alexandre Perreault: 1 gold, 4 silver

Nathan Schiffmann: 1 gold, 2 silver, 1 bronze

Will Barrett: 1 gold, 1 silver, 2 bronze

Ryan Jensen: 1 gold, 1 silver, 2 bronze

Allen Zheng: 1 gold, 1 silver

Brendan Van Herk: 1 gold

Louis Bertrand: 3 silver

Thomas Boyd: 2 silver

Noah Wagner: 1 silver, 1 bronze

Evan Aguiar-Winter: 1 silver