Modris Lorbergs
The 60th Anniversary for the North American Baltic Swim Meet “is ready for celebration”. The 2013 Annual meet will be held Saturday, October 26th, in Brampton, at the Kiwanis Center of Excelllence (formerly McMurchy pool) at 5:00 p.m..
This year’s BALTIC swim meet will actually be only the 57th actual competition meet held, three were unfortunately cancelled, 2004, ‘06, an ‘12 due to an insufficient number of ‘timely’ participant registrations to host a viable swim meet.
The current host Committee members, Meet Managers, comprised of Allison Timusk
( ,416-823-2823) and Mai Kreem (416-924-6028) for Estonians, Jonas Juodis ( ,416-239-4445) for Lithuanians, and Modris Lorbergs ( ,416-626-7262) for Latvians, are volunteers who have been relentless in their efforts towards the success of maintaining the tradition of this unique swim meet. Countless hours are spent phoning and emailing potential participants and all Baltic organizations to continue their participation and support for this historic event.
The Baltic Swim Meet originated in the day when BAFNA, Baltic Athletic Federations in North America, was the sport governing body for Baltic Sports. It is as a result of the “Love of Sport”, the relentlessness of individuals that BAFNA was organized by the Baltic immigrants to North America, to perpetuate the spirit of sport competition among themselves, in their newly adopted homeland. Competitions were organized on both sides of the USA/CAN border.
The swim competition, only one of several sports directed by BAFNA, has had a long history of notable competitors who emerged from the Baltic swim meets to attain International recognition at Olympic, Pan Am, World and Commonwealth events.
While official time records are still being maintained, thanks to Mrs.Kreem, the main focus for the Baltic Swim Meet has been primarily to encourage swimmers to participate in our competition, with FUN and CHALLENGE as the main focus.
The organizing committee is looking forward to seeing many new participants as well as to have many former participants return for an encore.
Swim meet information packages and entry forms are available from Committee members, Baltic Cultural centres and electronically,
www.lsak.org .
NOBODY ever leaves a BALTIC swim meet disappointed!
