Smith to race before Games

MICHELLE SMITH is to move to a new training base in the US this week in the run-up to the Olympics. She also intends to have one final outing before the Atlanta Games

She hopes to compete in a 400 metres freestyle race - an event in which she has not qualified for the Olympics. "It would be a case of taking a break from the day to day training," says her husband and coach Eric de Bruin.

Meanwhile, there was disappointing news over the weekend for Colin Lowth, the talented 19-year-old Drogheda swimmer who had hoped to go to Atlanta

The IASA pushed Lowth's claim based on the fact that he has achieved B times in 200 metres butterfly and 400 metres freestyle but the association's submission has been rejected by the OCI.

Lowth's claim seemingly became tenuous in the eyes of the OCI when he failed to improve his times in the "Scottish ASA championships in Edinburgh recently.

The OCI work on the principle of how close a competitor is to an A time rather than how much that competitor is inside the B standards

The rest of the Irish team are preparing in the US. They are Marion Madine, Earl McCarthy, Nick O'Hare and Adrian O'Connor.

At the World Masters in Pond's Forge, Sheffield, at the weekend Claire O'Dwyer (nee Small) won the 50 metres breaststroke event (for 55 to 59-year-olds) in 35.81 seconds. The Cork Masters club took silver in the medley relay.

The Guinness pool in Dublin is the venue for the Division II Irish Age Group championships this Saturday and Sunday starting at 9 a.m. on both days.