Lauren van Oosten
Lauren van Oosten (right) and Liz Warden at Kos staging camp for 2004 Olympics
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| Full name | Lauren van Oosten | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| National team |
 Canada
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| Born |
November 17, 1978 Nanaimo, British Columbia |
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| Height | 1.70 m (5 ft 7 in) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Weight | 64 kg (141 lb) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sport | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sport | Swimming | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Strokes | Breaststroke | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| College team | University of Calgary | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Medal record
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Lauren van Oosten (born November 17, 1978) is a Canadian competition swimmer and a breaststroke specialist.
She is originally from Nanaimo, British Columbia and is of Dutch heritage. She grew up and learned to swim in Nanaimo, before moving to the national training centre at the University of Calgary in Calgary, Alberta.
Lauren has been an integral part of the National Swim Team since 1997. Since then she has won a total of 9 international medals (bronze, silver and gold) and has set two Canadian records, one (200 m breaststroke) that still stands and one (100 m breaststroke) that lasted for six years (1998–2004). She attributes much of her success to her coach, Jan Bidrman.
Her first international meet was the Pan Pacific Swimming Championships in Fukuoka, Japan in August 1997. There she came from sixth place to third in the final 50 metres of the 200 m breaststroke race to win a bronze medal. This incredible performance qualified her for the 1998 World Aquatics Championships in Perth, Western Australia. At this World Championships Lauren swam a best time, set a Canadian record and won a bronze medal in the 100 m breaststroke with a time of 1:08:66.
From there she went to the 1998 Commonwealth Games that summer. This meet awarded her a silver medal (4*100 m medley relay) and 2 bronze medals (100 m breaststroke, 200 m breaststroke).
The 1999 Pan American Games were held in Winnipeg, Manitoba, from July 23 to August 8, 1999. Lauren won a medal in all the events she entered which included the 100-metre breaststroke (gold), 200-metre breaststroke (bronze), and 4*100-metre medley relay (silver).
Lauren had a major disappointment when she didn’t make the Olympic team in 2000. Up until this point she had been ranked first in Canada, but was only able to manage a 5th place finish at Olympic trials.
She also didn’t make the World Championships team in 2001 or the Commonwealth Games team in 2002. She was in a nasty slump and fading out of the Canadian swimming picture. However the 2003 season proved to be a come back year for van Oosten.
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Wikipedia