We LOVE what we do here at Paul Sadler Swimland and we have a team of people who love the water and swimming. It is sometimes difficult to see where swimming lessons can lead so we wanted to share in the journey of one of our swimmers and his parents.
Sebastian started lessons when he was young at a different swim school, however his parents were concerned with the limited exposure to deep water so started looking for a new swim school. They went for a trial at our Paul Sadler Swimland Essendon location and his mum remembers ‘he got more out of the 15 minute 1:1 than he had in the weeks, even months at his other lessons. We put the kids into swim lessons to keep them safer – we always saw it as like an insurance policy and without the deep water and survival aspects we were really questioning what we were getting out of the lessons.’
He began his journey with Paul Sadler Swimland and each week his parents noticed his love for lessons and swimming grow and grow. ‘He really began to thrive with the positive encouragement at Paul Sadler and with the consistent tips on how to improve and what he needed to do to get to the next level. The personal challenge and positive reinforcement really resonated with him as a little boy!’ mentioned his dad.
‘Once in lessons with the team at Paul Sadler Swimland, the experience of the teachers and the structure of the lessons compared to where we had been just really shone through and Sebastian’s real love for swimming was sparked.’
Sebastian continued through the program and completed his 1km swim at the age of 7. He went on to complete both his 3km and 5km swims and received his Diploma at the age of 10.
He went on to join a swim club and try his hand at competitive swimming and this year, in January, at the age of 11, competed in the Victorian Sprint Championships at MSAC, reaching finals for his breaststroke.
Sebastian is still swimming a few times a week and one of the things he loves the most is being able to compete in his school swimming championships – ‘of all the competitions, inter school swimming is my favourite. It’s so much fun competing against the other schools and feeling good enough to make it through to the regionals. My relay team has made the regionals for the last few years and we are hoping to get even further this year. Plus, you get a day off school for all the competitions and then when you go back the next day everyone cheers for us – it’s pretty cool!’
We often talk about giving our swimmers a skill for life and the joys of swimming, but it’s great to hear and celebrate the successes of our swimmers, like Sebastian and many others who developed their love of and passion for swimming in our lessons. We love what we do and we’re so glad that you’ve loved it as well!
