The clear and unambiguous tale about The Little Engine That Could is a perfect illustration of Windward Road Primary school’s success in swimming, having defied the odds stacked against them.

The story, which boasts the underlying theme of the little blue engine overcoming a seemingly impossible task, while repeating its motto “I think I can” is used to teach children the value of optimism and hard work.

When compared to the powerhouse schools of the sport, which boast a number of high-quality and decorated swimmers, Windward Road is like the little engine, small in stature, but big in heart.

The school, known mostly for its academic and track and field exploits, took a bold dive into the aquatics arena through the vision of head coach of Tornadoes Swim Club Wendy Lee, with the assistance of Pamela “Aunty Pam” Anglin and Coach Horace “Andy” Anderson, both equipped with their Lifeguard and Canadian Life Certificates.

The programme got under way in 2014 with only 11 swimmers involved and, as expected, was and is still faced with a number of challenges.

“The programme started with Coach Wendy’s vision of adopting/sponsoring an inner-city school to teach them to swim, to expose them to a different sport and to ultimately merge them into the Tornadoes Swim Club family.

“After considering a number of schools, we eventually settled for Windward Road Primary. The approval was given by the principal and we started with 11 students, and by the end of the first 10 weeks we were down to eight swimmers,” Anglin, an alumna of the institution told the Jamaica Observer in a recent interview.

“There were many challenges throughout the programme, one of which was the daily fee of $200 for the pool maintenance, also the bus fare and daily refreshment for the swimmers. Notwithstanding, we were able to complete the programme and in September 2014, two of the swimmers — Rihanna Gayle and Adrian Balfour — joined the Tornadoes club and the others all went over by the end of the year,” she added.

By July 2015, into its second year, the programme continued a downward spiral with 10 students staying the course, but that number dwindled to six at the end of the programmes due to the same challenges.

But amidst the adversity, Windward Road, like the little engine, overcame the difficult terrain to achieve success.

Among their top accolades are the Milo Prep/Primary Championship Trophy in the Primary division, amassing 22 points. In the same year they had three representatives in the Life Span Open Water Swim at the James Bond Beach.

Adrian Balfour, Rihanna Gayle and Novado Lawrence took part in and all completed the 750-metre race. Both Balfour and Gayle were later named recipients of scholarships to Orlando Classics Meet in the United States.

The duo also starred at the recently concluded Amateur Swimming Association of Jamaica (ASAJ)/Tastee Prep/Primary Schools’ Meet, leading the school to the top primary honours with a whopping 63 points. They also placing 10th overall on a list of 47 schools, bettering a number of teams boasting 60 or more swimmers on their way to the monumental feat.

While balancing swimming with preparing for GSAT exams next year, Balfour won the first-ever gold medal for Windward Road in the 50m breaststroke and followed up with bronze medals in the 50m and 100m freestyle and the 50m butterfly.

Gayle, who is also preparing for exams, won bronze in 50m breaststroke and was the top girl of the meet in her age group.

Prior to that, she came out victorious when tackling the 2,000m race at the Life Span Open Water event, while Balfour and Lawrence produced creditable performances. Jordan Parkins and Oshay Campbell also showed improvement in the 1,000m category.

Despite their current success rate, Anderson outlined that this year’s programme has ended with only two swimmers, but is optimistic of rebuilding for 2017 through a ‘Learn to swim’ programme.

“The challenges were even greater in the latter stages of this year, as the parents were just not able to cope with the daily demand and we lost more swimmers. But at present, we are trying hard to keep the programme alive,” Anderson noted.

He continued: “We will be doing a ‘Learn to swim’ program starting January 2017 to increase the number of swimmers, and we sincerely hope that our inner-city children will be able to benefit from the programme.

“As we see the way forward, there is not much we can do as swim teachers, as our voluntary service is not where we would have wanted it to be. But we are hopeful and we look forward to meet with the new set of swimmers and their parents for the coming year.”