More than fourteen years ago, the Swimfaster Swimming Club of Salt was created with the aim of offering a swimming learning service, mainly focused on competition. Since then, the sports organization has only grown. In its beginnings, the club only had eight swimmers who trained in the Municipal Pool of Salt and now there are more than eighty, among whom there are thirty children, who compete between the ages of 8 and 19, and fifty masters , who compete from the age of 20 until they announce their retirement. Through individualized learning methods and with small groups, the CN Swimfaster Salt aims for the athletes of the club to improve their sports and technical level effectively while increasing their performance for a total improvement, betting on the economy of movement in the aquatic environment.
The blame for this success lies with Sergi Aznar, its ideologist, founder and current technical director of the entity. Aznar is an experienced swimmer who has an extended career and has been around different clubs, including La Jonquera, Figueres, Sant Andreu, Montjuic, Terrassa, Castàlia Castelló de la Plana and Olivar de Saragossa. On the other hand, he also spent 4 years at the High Performance Center of Sant Cugat del Vallès and has an enviable record: he is a medalist in the Spanish breaststroke and butterfly championships in his category, he has a sixth place in the Europeus i ha anat estat convocat amb la selecció catalana i espanyola de natació.
Currently, apart from managing the club, he continues his sporting career competing as a master. Aznar defines Swimfaster Salt as a close club: “We are a competition swimming club, but we are a family club. We all add up, we are all important. We care about brotherhood, sacrifice and constancy.” In addition, he also considers that being part of a municipality like Salt plays in its favor. “The people have always supported us. We arrived at the Salt Municipal Swimming Pool many years ago, when I was studying at the University of Girona, and we have the support of the UFEC, the Salt City Council and Eurofitness Salt. It is a source of pride for us that Salt has a competitive swimming team”, he says.
This year has been particularly fruitful for the club, but they still have some time left. 20 Swimfaster Salt swimmers (or what is the same: a quarter of those who make up the organization) participated in the Catalan summer championships held in Tarragona during the weekend of June 11 and 12 . The Saltencs achieved a total of 19 medals, crowning themselves as the second most decorated club in all of Catalonia and the first of the Girona regions. To top it off, just one month later the club took 7 participants to the Spanish championships, which were held in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria from July 7 to 10. The Swimfaster Salt achieved a total of 9 medals: 6 gold, 2 silver and 1 bronze. Out of 160 participating clubs, the Salten club was in a good 49th position.
This summer the activity does not stop. On the horizon are the European Championships, which will be held in Rome at the end of August. The Swimfaster Salt plans to carry a total of 7 swimmers. Sergi Aznar assures that there is a chance of getting a medal, quite a challenge for the club. “We’re looking forward to it. We have to train all summer, but the goal is very important. It’s a challenge for the swimmers who will be there but also for the club”, he says.
