Sault swimmer sets personal best time at Olympic trials

Paige Banton of Sault Ste. Marie had the swim of her life this morning at the Olympic trials in Toronto.

Competing in the 100m breaststroke at the Pan Am Sports Centre, Banton finished first in her heat with a time of 1:12.35 — shaving six-tenths of a second off her personal best.

However, her 100m time wasn't quite good enough to land Banton a spot on the Olympic team. She qualified for tonight's B Final, not the A Final.

The B Final is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. and will be live streamed at cbc.ca and on CBC Gem.

Her next crack at the Olympic team will come Friday, when she is scheduled to race in the 200m breaststroke preliminaries at 9:30 a.m.

Banton, a former member of the Sault Surge locally who is now swimming competitively at Marshall University in the U.S., is at this week's meet with her coach from Marshall, Ian Walsh.

Banton was the subject of a recent feature story on SooToday. You can read it HERE.