Earlier last week, I announced the Varsity team that will compete in the post-season for Seton where no more exhibition swimming is allowed. Ten years ago, after having the season for nearly half the team end abruptly at this point, we hatched the idea of a fun, season-ending meet for all of the members of Seton’s Junior Varsity team.
The Junior Varsity Invitational was the result of that plan. We had just started the State Championship meet at that point – how hard could this one be? So we set out on a journey to create an annual event at the beautiful Fitch Warrenton Aquatic and Recreation Facility, which was brand new at the time.
The meet continues to grow. On Saturday, we had 194 swimmers from 12 teams that traveled from as far away as Chesapeake, VA for a fun-filled meet where I do all of the announcing personally. Fortunately, there was no overlapping National Catholic meet this year so I didn’t have to do the trip back to Warrenton during the middle of that meet.
The meet got off to a great start when Seton Managers Katie Moore and Kaela Catabui sang the National Anthem in beautiful harmony. They were wonderful! And the fun continued, even through challenges with the CTS system. When you get girls Irish Dancing to the Drop Kick Murphys, you know people are having fun.
The scoring for the meet ended up very positive for Seton:
Boys
Seton 254
Norfolk Academy 214
Collegiate School 175
Fredericksburg Christian 171
Randolph-Macon Academy 120
North Cross 73
Wakefield 63
The Carmel School 23
Highland 11
Girls
Collegiate School 286
Seton 266.5
North Cross 162
Fredericksburg Christian 149
Norfolk Academy 113.5
Williamsburg Christian 53
Highland 42
Wakefield 28
The Covenant School 13
Chelsea Academy 7
Randolph-Macon Academy 6
The Carmel School 2
I was very excited for the future of Seton Swimming while I watched so many young swimmers swim so well. Thanks to Mrs. Carole Pechie, we actually had individual medal winners for the first time, so here are the Seton Swimmers who earned medals:
There were so many great swims that it is going to be impossible to mention all of them here, but here are the ones that struck me the most as I was announcing during the meet:
- Ben Dealey, 9, just blew me away. I saw this great butterfly, and I yell over to Mr. Dealey who was working the laptop, “Quick, who’s that?”. How exciting it was for me to find out that his son had improved so much that I didn’t even recognize him. Ben cut 2.94 seconds from his 50 Fly PR to take 11th He also cut 4.04 seconds from his 50 Breast PR for 9th place and .07 seconds from his 50 Free PR for 20th place.
- Caroline Griffin, 7, is going to be a good one, I can already see that. She lowered her 50 Back PR leading off a relay by 1.66 seconds to go 34.18 – that’s very fast for a 7th She also cut .90 seconds from her 50 Fly PR. That 50 Fly PR was good enough for 9th place.
- RJ Kenna, 7, is the last in a long line of Seton athletes, and he’s already starting to show signs of being able to follow in his brother’s footsteps. He went 40.58 in his first attempt at 50 Breaststroke to take 8th RJ also took 14th and 15th in 100 IM and 50 Fly, respectively.
- Patrick Murray, 9, showed how dramatically he has improved this season with a 18.18 second PR in 100 Free!
- David Catabui, 9, looked stronger than I’ve ever seen him as he cut through the water in 50 Free and 50 Back. He had PRs in both of those events, by .82 seconds and by 8.19 seconds, respectively.
- Justin Fioramonti, 7, like his brothers, continues to make his parents look good. He’s another hard-working Fioramonti boy who knows that, if you work hard-enough, you can even overcome your father’s genetics. I really like what I saw in his 100 Free where he lowered his PR by a whopping 2.68 seconds. His 50 Free also looked very strong with a .70 second PR.
- TheresA Hartung, 11, has made such a great impression on me with her improvement this year, that I can even spell her name correctly now. She had a 5.05 second drop in 100 Free and 1.78 second drop in 50 Free.
- John Paul Kleb, 10, showed me some real potential in Butterfly after his 2.16 second PR to go 34.19. Can’t wait to work with him some more on it next season.
- Peter O’Donohue, 8, continues to improve on how well he can take advantage of his significant length. He went 1:09.20 in 100 Free, an improvement of 1.53 seconds. And in 50 Fly, he went 37.32, an improvement of 1.71 seconds. I think Peter is going to score some serious points for us in the future.
- Katharine Rowzie, 7, is going to be another good one for Seton. Her 1:16.94 in 100 Free was 2.93 seconds faster than she’s ever swum before. In 50 Back, she cut another big 1.65 seconds.
- Edith Barvick, 8, kept getting my attention from the announcers stand, particularly during her 1:23.98 100 IM where she showed me that she has potential in all four (4) strokes. Edith also had a big 2.01 second drop in 50 Back.
Here are the other swimmers that wrapped up their season with Personal Records. Remember, there are probably a lot of swims not mentioned here because, to get a PR, you have to have a previous time, and we don’t normally swim some of these events:
- Katie Albin, 7, was super in 100 Free, lowering her PR by 1.34 seconds
- Kaela Catabui, 7, didn’t just sing well, she also swam well. How about a 7.23 second PR in 100 Free!
- Drew Dalrymple, 7, is going to be a good one for us. He broke :40 in 50 Fly for the first time with a 1.17 second PR.
- Katie Dealey, 7, cut another .31 seconds off of her 50 Free PR. Her 34.15 is starting to get pretty fast!
- MacKenzie Farmer, 9, has developed a pretty strong butterfly, and it showed with her .28 second PR.
- Rosie Hall, 9, has improved consistently all year long and that continued on Saturday when she cut 1.74 seconds from her 50 Back PR and .66 seconds from her 50 Breast PR.
- Dominic Hartung, 7, is another one who has come a long way since the beginning of the year., I like that 2.65 second PR in 100 Free and that .79 second PR in 50 Free.
- Therese Pechie, 8, jumped into the meet at the last minute and used the opportunity to PR in 100 IM, by 1.01 seconds and in 50 Fly, by 1.00 seconds.
- Bernadette Hassan, 8, always raises her hand when I ask for a volunteer to try something new – like 50 Fly where she cut 2.00 seconds from her PR.
And here were some other great swims from the meet:
- Phillip Ashton, 10, swam for the first time at Seton as a sophomore, and has shown tremendous improvement in all four (4) strokes as evidenced by his 1:18.94 in 100 IM. I have also been very pleased with how fast his freestyle is getting.
- Nicholas Foeckler, 9, brought his own cheering section to the meet so that they could see the dramatic levels of improvement that he has experienced since the beginning of the season. I’m sure his brothers could not help but be impressed with his freestyle and backstroke.
- Gianna Gonzalez, 8, is another 1st year swimmer at Seton who has improved a ton!
- Ryan Hall, 9, is nearly breaking :30 in 50 Free in his first year of swimming. He’s so big and strong – I’m really looking forward to continue to help him develop as a swimmer for Seton.
- Chris Hartung, 11, will definitely be moving to the big pool next year. He made perhaps the most improvement of anyone on the team, but he was so helpful in demonstrating stroke concepts that I was teaching that I decided to let him be the “big fish in the little pond”. 1:10 in 100 Free for a new swimmer is really good!
- Ruthie Hartung, 9, smiled most of the season – I would have too had I learned as much as she did. Ruthie is a really good swimming student, and it will pay off for sure as she gets older.
- Jeremy Kleb, 7, is going to be a leader on this team when he is older – I can already see it in him. He also looks like he’s going to score a lot of points in Butterfly.
- Anne Konstanty, 7, is always the first one to practice every morning. She just quietly works and tries to apply whatever concept I’m trying to teach.
- Marcie Van de Voorde, 7, was awfully smiley this year – she must have been having fun getting better!
Loads of Great Swims at Seton’s Winter Invitational at Central Park
It really says something about the quality (and quantity) of our parent volunteers that we can host a meet seven (7) teams – without the Head Coach! Well that’s what we did on Saturday, January 17th. And I really appreciate the ability to get away with my wife’s family to celebrate her parent’s 55th wedding anniversary. Thanks so much!
And how exciting it was for me to return home and see 66 new Personal Records – and a boy’s victory over Fredericksburg Christian! I wish I could have been there for that!
It looks like Battlefield had a pretty good team, particularly on the girl’s where we are pretty strong this year. I would have loved to have seen that first girl’s medley relay where we out-touched them by only .69 seconds. I think I would have also enjoyed watching Anna Kenna beat Courtney Jones from FCS in 100 Fly – Courtney is a very good swimmer. Here’s the way the scores turned out:
Boys
Battlefield 166 Seton 119
Seton 159 Fredericksburg Christian 127
Seton 144 John Paul the Great 131
Seton 190 Wakefield 72
Seton 214 Wakefield Country Day 41
Seton 229 Ad Fontes 3
Girls
Battlefield 166 Seton 117
Seton 156 John Paul the Great 110
Seton 184 Fredericksburg Christian 80
Seton 202 Wakefield 47
Seton 212 Ad Fontes 37
Seton 212 Wakefield Country Day 27
From what I could see from the results, and from what I heard from the other Coaches, here are the most impressive swims from this meet:
- What has Fioramonti been feeding those boys?
- Joe Fioramonti somehow cut 14.77 seconds from his 100 Fly PR – how do you do that? He also cut .95 seconds from his 200 IM PR.
- Justin Fioramonti somehow cut 10.42 seconds in 100 Breast.
- Matthew Fioramonti somehow cut 9.21 seconds in 100 Fly. He also cut .81 seconds in 50 Free, which is pretty big – he’s now going 26.62.
- Mark Fioramonti had very strong performances in his first ever attempts at the 200 and 500 Free
- Alex Ceol clearly had a nice swim in 100 Breaststroke with his 4.14 second PR. Alex also cut another .44 seconds from his 50 Free
- Kalli Dalrymple took her first shot at the 200 Free and did so well that her performance bumped her onto the post-season Varsity team – nice work Kalli!
- Tommy Flook looks like he had a great swim in 500 Free, cutting 25.50 seconds and breaking 6:00 minutes – very nice Tommy! He also cut .90 seconds from his 100 Breast PR
- Dominic Hartung lowered his 100 Breast PR by 39.25 seconds and swam a completely legal stroke – way to go Dominic! I also really like Dominic’s 8.99 second PR in 100 Free and his .67 second PR in 50 Free – he broke :40!
- Ruthie Hartung cut 11.27 seconds from her 100 Free PR to go 1:23.20 – a huge improvement from the beginning of the year!
- Mary Heim looks like she had a heck of a meet with four (4) PRs! She cut 8.86 seconds in 200 IM, 5.39 seconds in 50 Back leading off a medley, 1.10 seconds in 100 Breast, and .33 seconds in 50 Free leading off a relay. That’s quite a day Mary!
- Mark O’Donohue is really starting to get fast. He went 58.81 in 100 Free after a .12 second PR. He also cut 4.03 seconds in 100 Back.
- Peter O’Donohue made great first-ever attempts at the 200 IM and the 500 Free – great job Peter!
- Bridget O’Malley cut 30.74 seconds from her 500 Free PR – that’s a lot. She also managed to cut a whopping 8.72 seconds from her 100 Fly PR!
- Cat Pechie made me very proud with her 2.58 second PR in 200 Free. I soooo sorry that I missed it Cat!
- Paul Pechie – I really liked that 7.72 second PR in 200 Free and that .75 second PR in 100 Free! 82 in 100 Free is not too shabby!
- Andrew Quinan had a big drop in 100 Breast, lowering his PR by 4.41 seconds to go 1:15.49 – that time is starting to get pretty competitive in the DAC. Andrew also cut .23 seconds from his 100 Free PR leading off a relay and .02 seconds from his 50 Free PR to break :26 for the first time! :25-high sounds so much better than 26-low, right Andrew!
- Martin Quinan continues to impress me with his freestyle. While I was gone, he cut another 5.60 seconds from his 500 Free PR.
- Dominic Wittlinger has clearly learned something about Backstroke – he cut his 50 Back PR by 5.88 seconds leading off a medley! He also cut 1.68 seconds in 100 Back and .69 seconds in 100 Free.
Here are the Personal Records that I saw in the results that I have not already mentioned:
- Philip Ashton had PRs in 50 Back leading off a medley by .12, in 50 Free by .45, and in 100 Breast by a whopping 4.77!
- Ashley Cackett dropped 5.85 seconds in 200 Free
- Kaela Catabui dropped a big 3.01 seconds in 50 Free and 1.52 seconds in 100 Breaststroke
- Tim Costello has gotten pretty fast in sprint freestyle this season, and that continued at this meet with a .22 second PR.
- Ben Dealey dropped 1.90 seconds in 100 Back and .23 seconds in 50 Free.
- Katie Dealey had a really big drop in 100 Back – 5.46 seconds! She also cut 1.12 seconds in 50 Free – that’s huge at this point in the season.
- Patrick Dealey completed the Dealey Family PR streak with three (3) of his own – by 6.08 seconds in 200 IM, by 1.59 seconds in 100 Fly, and by .52 seconds in 50 Free leading off a relay.
- Gianna Gonzalez cut a ton off her 50 Free time – how about 2.50 seconds to break :40 for the first time.
- Caroline Griffin is getting really fast for a 7th grader – in 100 Free, after dropping another 1.46 seconds, she went 1:11.08
- Patrick Hall cut 1.44 seconds from his 100 Breast PR
- Rosie Hall had a really big PR in 100 Back where she swam 7.71 seconds than ever before. She also cut nearly a second (.96 actually) from her 50 Free PR.
- Ryan Hall lowered his 100 Breast PR by .74 seconds.
- Bernadette Hassan smiled her way to a 1.02 second PR in 50 Free.
- Sean Kellogg lowered his 100 Breast PR by 3.41 seconds
- Anna Kenna cut .01 seconds from her 200 IM PR.
- RJ Kenna had a big 3.63 second drop in 100 Back.
- Jeremy Kleb had a nice .76 second PR in 100 Back.
- John Paul Kleb also looks like he had a nice swim – in 50 Free, he cut .10 seconds.
- Brian Koehr had two nice PRs. In 200 Free, he cut 2.04 seconds and in 100 Back he cut .94 seconds.
- Anne Konstanty cut 2.99 seconds in 100 Back.
- John O’Donohue led off a medley relay and lowered his 50 Back PR by 1.00 seconds
- Meghan O’Malley continued to improve in 100 Fly, lowering her PR by another .11 seconds.
- Therese Pechie cut another .15 seconds from her 50 Back PR leading off a medley relay
- Michaela Pennefather lowered her 50 Back PR by 3.09 seconds leading off a medley relay too.
- Vivian Zadnik lowered her 500 Free PR by 4.75 seconds.
Results from a Small Group We Sent to Richmond on Jan 16th
On Friday night before our Winter Invitational, we sent some “A” Relays and some Seniors down to Richmond to join Collegiate for a fun opportunity to get in a few more swims:
- Dani Flook took advantage of the opportunity to cut another 3.19 seconds from her 200 IM PR.
- Anna Kenna had a chance to swim Breaststroke for the rare time and lowered her PR by 1.83 seconds.
- Brian Koehr also swam Breaststroke and lowered his PR by 1.12 seconds to 1:10.81
New Qualifiers for the VISAA State Championship Meet
As of right now, the individual qualifiers for States are:
- Dani Flook
- Emily Heim
- Anna Kenna
- Claire Kenna
- Kimberly Rector
- Alex Sinner
- Brian Koehr
We also have a number of relays that have qualified. The meet is February 13-14th in Richmond. I have a block of hotel rooms reserved.
I’ll do my best to publish a draft of our State meet entries very soon so we can start planning logistics.
We are really pushing hard in practice during the month of January – do everything you can not to miss practice so we can all be ready for the last three (3) championship meets starting with our VISAA Division II Invitational this Saturday.
The Remainder of the Championship Season
This National Catholic High School Championship was the first of four (4) championship meets for us this season. The remaining three (3) meets are over the next three (3) weekends, including:
- The VISAA Division II Invitational Championship – Saturday, January 31st at the Freedom Center
- The DAC Conference Championship – Saturday, February 7th at St. Michael the Archangel
- The VISAA State Swimming and Diving Championship – Friday and Saturday, February 13-14th at the Collegiate Aquatic Center in Richmond.
Entries and information are posted for the Division II Invitational next Saturday. All Varsity swimmers should be on deck ready to stretch by 12:39 p.m. at Freedom. Non-varsity swimmers are of course welcomed to join the team on deck – but wear your uniform.
See you at practice!
Coach Jim Koehr