We just passed a significant milestone.
Since 2002, Seton just passed 200 hosted swimming meets with our 201st meet this past Saturday! And 65 of those 201 were big championship meets!
Saturday’s meet had a very typical 323 swimmers, so assuming a modest average of 200 to 250 swimmers per meet over the past 26-years, that means that we’ve hosted between 40,000 and 50,000 non-unique swimmers and divers!
At one point in the live stream, Coach Joe Hurley asked me if I ever envisioned that Seton meets would look like this in the future. No way!
Recall that in 2002, Seton already had a successful team that used the standard approach to running meets at that time. With Joanne Pretz as the Team President and Charles Seltman as the referee, kids would bring index cards with them to the blocks, three timers would record times on the cards, and then the cards would go back to Mr. Seltman’s wife Kathryn who would use them to score the meet by hand.
Referee Charles Seltman at DAC Champs, February 5, 2005
Over time, Mrs. Seltman developed an excel spreadsheet to score the meets. Here’s an example from a meet on December 14, 2002, against North Stafford (It was fun looking at some of the old names among the entries):
Seton vs N. Stafford-Meet Results
When I started with my partner-in-crime, Chris Cook, whose son Nevin had recently joined the team with my son Kevin, we used to have a conversation annually that started with “what are we going to do bigger this season?”.
This was before we had our GEMS and any saying like, “it is not about good; it is about better.” So, you can see that our current ideas about excellence infused the team from the very beginning. In the business lingo of the era, we talked about “continuous improvement”, so that was just how Chris and I, both entrepreneurs, thought about it, I guess.
The first thing Chris did was buy the team our first sound system so we could have music at the meets. We still pretty much use the same playlist that started from a Father’s Day gift from my oldest daughter, now Kaitlyn Brindle, who gave me a two-CD set she had burned called “Dad’s Ultimate Rock Mix, volumes I and II”.
Then, after attending National Catholics for the first time in 2004, we saw how a meet could be run using Hy-Tek’s Meet Manager software to compliment the Team Manager software that I inherited from the prior coach, Terry Shipko.
Could we use Meet Manager ourselves for every meet, even regular season meets? Heck yeah! So, Chris hired the company that ran National Catholics (“BeSmartt”) as a consultant to train us on how to do it. I remember meeting in one of the classrooms on the 2nd floor of the Freedom Center to do our first training.
Then, in an era when websites were just coming into their own, Chris decided that making parents filter through AOL e-mail boxes to find information about what was going on could be eliminated with v1.0 of www.setonswimming.org. What a game-changer! Today’s version looks quite a bit different than the original Active.com template we used, but the concept lives as a resource for teams far beyond our own team. Last year, our site had 74,000 page views!
The next big breakthrough came in 2008 when Seton hosted the VSIS (as the State swimming organization was called then) State Championship Meet for the first time. I had joined the VSIS State Committee as Executive Secretary with a personal agenda to create two-division scoring for the State Championship meet. After that mission was fulfilled with our first Division II State Championship in 2006, led by Kevin Koehr and Nevin Cook with Fr. Sean Koehr as the anchor on our relays – Chris asked if we shouldn’t try to stress test the meet infrastructure that we had built to try to make the State Championship meet better too.
It was a big endeavor for a small school, but that turned out to be the first of five (5) times in a row that we hosted. Our idea that the State Championship swim meet should look more like a Friday night football game than a big USA meet lives on in the spirit of the meet, even today.
I’ll never forget Chris’ idea to have the top eight (8) finalist walk out of a tunnel through a stream of laser lights – like a big WWE match. We had the lights set up in the NVMS conference room and realized that we could only see the lights on the walls and not in the air. We need fog to reflect the lights! So, our next meeting was in his conference room filled with blinding smoke – we knew we had it!
Check out the Finals of the 200 Freestyle at the 2010 State Championship with an 8-year old Coach Shane Koehr carrying the sign to lead Seton super-star Jameson Hill through the fog to the blocks. The announcer was the original “Voice of Seton Swimming”, Tom Minarik.
Coach Mike Stott (Collegiate, SwimmingWorld), Coach Koehr, and Chris Cook at States 2008
Over the next fifteen (15) years, the improvement didn’t stop. Bill Dealey spent more than a decade making even more improvements to our technology, including the introduction of dolphin electronic stopwatches and new ways to take advantage of the scoreboard at Freedom. Bill became such a coveted resource that he also scored the state championship meet for something like ten (10) years.
And our most recent revolution was the introduction of Paul Fifield’s live stream in 2020. With Bill Dealey’s help providing custom programming to get names and times into the broadcast, I don’t have to tell you that our live streams are at least comparable to what you might see on the SEC network.
In the spirit of continuous improvement that started with Chris Cook in 2002, I still get calls from Mr. Fifield that start with “Hey Jim, I was just thinking ……”. I love it!
Excellence is not about good; it is about better.
200 meets down, but the spirit of continuous improvement, enshrined as “Excellence” in our GEMS, will continue.
“Culture is King”; Seton’s Culture of Parental Involvement
As I was discussing with Coach Matt Schroer on the livestream broadcast, reaching this milestone is a real testament to the culture of Seton School where every parent feels like their individual contribution is not only appreciated, but is expected. In a school that takes seriously the Church’s teaching that parents are the primary educators of their children, Seton parents put that into action.
Let’s make sure to highlight that the entire evolution of how Seton Swimming runs a swim meet was driven by parents, not professionals. If there is a secret sauce for Seton Swimming, it is the culture of the school with our complete reliance on volunteers.
One thing that makes the Seton Swimming reliance on volunteers even more amazing is that many of the volunteers are not even parents of Seton Swimmers!
Coach Bryce Bohman is the latest, and one of the best examples. Coach Bohman coaches some of the top groups at the Nations Capital Swim Club (NCAP) at the Freedom Center. He is a professional swimming coach with a swimming pedigree at the NCAA and Olympic Trials levels that tops even the great Coach Ross Palazzo, another version of this same story.
Coach Bohman’s group practices right before our groups, so he has seen our team for several years. Just as Coach Palazzo was moving on to do the things that 25-years olds should be doing with their lives, Coach Bohman came up to me on deck one morning and asked if he could be a part of what we were doing by helping to coach.
Yes!
Coach Bryce Bohman does not have any children at Seton. (Hopefully that will change one day, but they are at least ten (10) years away from being old enough ) And Coach Bohman is far from the only coach that does not have children at Seton. Of our fifteen volunteer coaches, nine (9) of them are driven by reasons beyond parenthood.
We have very generous people who coach because they are incredibly passionate and knowledgeable about the sport, like Coach Ashley Keapproth. We have people who coach because they used to be on the team and want to give back to an organization that gave them so much. I’m thinking of coaches like Jeremy Kleb, Kevin Koehr, Shane Koehr, Mary Claire Osilka. And we have coaches who first got involved when their kids were on the team and continue to coach like Jerry Zadnik and Joanne Pretz. Some of us, like Coach Pretz, have been around so long that we even have grandchildren on the team now!
The examples don’t stop with the coaches. At the end of last season, we recognized 88 unique parent volunteers! And those were just the ones that played some significant and identifiable role. Nearly every family helped in some way, even if it was simply contributing to hospitality. What a blessing!
More examples seemed endless on Saturday with countless white Seton officials’ shirts nearly everywhere on deck. There were so many stalwarts on deck that I can’t possibly mention them all, but let me highlight a few of the newer ones among the many examples I could cite:
- Tommy Reynolds is doing an amazing job in his first year as head of officials. We made a big push this year for every school to supply at least two (2) stroke & turn judges – Seton now has sixteen (16)! – so Tommy has had use his significant management skill to organize all of them in ways different than we’ve had to before.
- Mike Wilson responded to our call for new Stroke & Turn Judges, and then when we realized that we needed another person to help on the dry deck (i.e., timing and scoring computers), he volunteered for that one too!
- Will Waldron, after years of doing anything that needed to be done (as well as coaching lacrosse), wanted to do more. Now he’s training to help Mr. Reynolds with duties as a Starter. On Saturday, he was there early asking me if he should get the timing pads in the water. I loved it!
- Yudi Sokban stepped up to take over the Head Timer responsibilities from Chris Condon whose last swimmer just graduated. Yudi was there even while his son was playing in a soccer game.
- Dan Arnold is the new “Voice of Seton Swimming”, taking over for our long-time announcer John Kleb. Dan is a natural performer who did a great job in his first outing with the complexities of Paul Fifield’s very elaborate live stream!
While contemplating the incredible level of volunteerism we have at Seton, it begs the question, “Why?”.
Like all things at Seton Swimming, I think it goes back to the link we’ve made between our Church and our team – a link to the True, the Good, and the Beautiful that we describe with our GEMS.
When you are grateful, your Gratitude brings a joy that you want to share. When you see Excellence, you want to be a part of it – especially if it helps your children. When you see the impact that Seton Swimming is having on other people and teams around us, you recognize the biblical admonition to live with Meekness. And, of course, when you Sacrifice, you recognize the count-intuitive Catholic notion that you always seem get more from the sacrifice than you gave.
God has truly blessed Seton School and Seton Swim & Dive. Viva Cristo Rey!
Meet Results
The Icebreaker Invitational was the beginning of the unique cadence we have for a Seton season for the swimmers and coaches too. In December, we concentrate very heavily on stroke technique and getting as many kids as possible to swim as many different events as possible. We are four (4) stroke swimmers at Seton, particularly in December. This past week, we concentrated on freestyle. The next two weeks will feature backstroke and then breaststroke/butterfly.
Then, over Christmas and in January, we will hit the conditioning much harder until we rest down for the championship meets in February. From what I saw on Saturday, I think the championship season is likely to treat Seton very well this year.
Although we lined up our entries with an emphasis on personal swimmer development rather than team scoring, the team scores still turned out quite favorably for us. We faced nine (9) girls’ teams and eight (8) boys’ teams – and we won with both the boys and girls against all comers, including a Division I team from Flint Hill.
Recall that regular season Dual Meets are scored as what is called a “3+ Dual Meet” which means there is actually a dual meet going on between every combination of teams present. For you math geeks out there, that means we had 9C2 Meets (i.e., the number of ways you can combine 9 teams, 2 at a time) going on for the girls and 8C2 for the boys – that is 36 girl’s meets and 28 boy’s meets, or 64 total Meets.
If you want to learn more about how high school swim meets are scored, you can check out my single most-read blog called, “So How is a High School Meet Scored, Anyway?”
Here’s how the scores turned out for our meets:
Girls
Seton Swim & Dive 195 Oakcrest 114
Seton Swim & Dive 222 Immanuel Christian 74
Seton Swim & Dive 235 Saint John Paul the Great 69
Seton Swim & Dive 221 Flint Hill 66
Seton Swim & Dive 220 Trinity Meadowview 65
Seton Swim & Dive 234 Fresta Valley Christian 57
Seton Swim & Dive 237 Evergreen Christian 45
Seton Swim & Dive 242 Fredericksburg Christian 43
Seton Swim & Dive 248 Veritas Collegiate (Arlington) 15
Boys
Seton Swim & Dive 156 Flint Hill 137
Seton Swim & Dive 201 Immanuel Christian 94
Seton Swim & Dive 207 Trinity Meadowview 80
Seton Swim & Dive 225 Fresta Valley Christian 57
Seton Swim & Dive 235 Saint John Paul the Great 39
Seton Swim & Dive 227 Fredericksburg Christian 37
Seton Swim & Dive 235 Evergreen Christian 32
Seton Swim & Dive 236 Veritas Collegiate (Arlington) 33
Believe it or not, we have another milestone that we are about to hit – 1,000 regular season meet victories since 2002!
With Saturday’s 17 wins, we now have a total of 966 regular season wins since 2002. So maybe we will hit it at Homecoming or at the VCAC Regular Season Championship meet?
Swimmers to Watch This Season
Last season, we graduated 30 seniors, including one of the most powerful group of boys that we have had in many years – as our record board can attest.
Connor Koehr, Liam Halisky, and Joe Borneman were three (3) of those seniors who helped break two (2) iconic relay records, one that was 20-years old and another that was 15-years old.
With the additional loss of swimmers like Max Wilson, Drew Nguyen, and William Sokban, you might be tempted to think that we are set for a “rebuilding” season this year on the boy’s side – but that is not looking like it will be the case.
Returning from one or both of those record-setting relays are Lionel Martinez (JR) and Daniel Sokban (SR) who I know you have read a lot about in the past and who I am sure you will be reading about a lot in the future.
Lionel Martinez (JR), in particular, continues to get faster with a 1.51 second PR in 500 Free and a 2.46 second PR in 100 Breaststroke (1:02.81) on Saturday. Those times are currently the 3rd and the 8th fastest times swum in the VISAA so far this year, and they are not even his primary events.
One new name that has already turned heads this season is Lionel’s younger brother, Thiago Martinez (SO). The level of improvement that I have seen from Thiago since last season, when he was already very good, has been astounding. On Saturday, he went 55.83 in 100 Fly (a 3.73 second PR), 57.67 in 100 Back (a 2.10 second PR), and 52.21 in 100 Free leading off a relay (a 1.45 second PR).
So, our boys “A” relay line-ups have great starts with Lionel, Daniel, and Thiago – and we have loads of strong competition coming up to fill those fourth “A” Relay spots, including:
- Jack Herwick (SO) who dropped 2.36 seconds in 100 Back and .84 seconds in 200 IM
- Dominic Judge (JR)
- Greg Bauer (SR)
- Michael Zahorchak (JR) who cut .48 seconds in 50 Free and 3.29 seconds in 100 Breaststroke on Saturday.
- Patrick Kay (SO)
- Luke Partridge (JR)
- Joey Lynch (SO) who cut .32 second in 50 Free, 2.37 seconds in 100 Free, and 1.98 seconds in 100 Back.
- Jonas Wilson (SO)
- Bennett Ellis (JR) who dropped another .17 seconds in 50 Free.
- Joel Bookwalter (FR) who returned to the team after a hiatus and is already showing signs of greatness after a 15.78 second PR in 200 Free and a 2.38 second PR in 100 Free.
- JJ Garvey (FR) who has taken a giant leap forward already this season with a 15.09 second PR in 200 IM, a 4.99 second PR in 100 Fly, and a 1.97second PR in 50 Back. I’m enjoying watching JJ grow into the mature young man that I know will be a leader on this team one day.
- Paul Partridge (8) who had two big PRs in events usually swum by older, more experienced swimmers. In the 200 IM, he cut 6.77 seconds, and in the 100 Fly, he cut 5.04 seconds. His 100 Fly time of 1:13.05 will score in a lot of high school meets.
It is hard for me to believe, but I think our girls’ team has a chance to duplicate last year’s record-breaking feats with the boys.
On the girl’s side, it all starts with our little superstar, Ariana Aldeguer (JR) who just committed to swim at the United States Naval Academy starting in 2027! Ariana is a returning All-State swimmer after winning the silver medal in 500 Free at States and breaking team records set by Seton icons like Katie Shipko and Anna Kenna. Katie’s records in the 200 Free and 500 Free dated back to 1999 and 2000!
In one of those wonderful life surprises, I learned that year that our former girl’s relay anchor Stella Paradise had two younger homeschooled sisters that are even faster!
Melissa Paradise (JR) is a great swimmer who particularly excels in backstroke. Her lead-off medley relay split this week was only .73 seconds off our team 50 Backstroke record, and if she achieves her goal time for 100 Backstroke, she could possibly break that team record also. Both of those team records are held by Seton All-America Anna Kenna, so that would be quite a feat!
Therese Paradise (8) is only in 8th grade, but if you’ve seen her in the water, it is something that requires a reminder. I haven’t seen an 8th grader dominate so quickly since Alex Doonis in the late 2000s or Katie Shipko in the late 1990s. Therese is an eight (8)-event swimmer who is capable of swimming on all three (3) of our “A” Relays at States.
Now for the truly exciting part: On Saturday, at the first meet of the season, we had a girls 400 Free Relay that went 3:48.43. The fourth swimmer on that relay? Maggie Schroer (SO), who has committed to training for swimming in a very serious manner this season.
To put that early-season time into perspective, it is currently the 4th fastest time swum in the entire VISAA this year. But more exciting for me, besides the fact that none of these girls are seniors, is what I see when I compare that time to our team record of 3:40.51.
That team record was set at States in 2010 by a Seton girls’ team that was so fast, it took 3rd place overall at States – not just Division II, but Division I also! That relay, in particular, featured some of the most iconic names in Seton swimming history including Alex Doonis, Cat Rogers, Carolyn Claybrooks, and Lauren “the Machine” Donohoe.
After winning the gold medal in the 200 Free Relay at States that year, they also took the bronze medal in the 400 Free Relay with splits of 54.60, 55.90, 56.06, and 53.93, respectively. Can Ariana, Melissa, Therese, and Maggie do that? I have no doubt!
I should be careful not to leave you all with the impression that the only good news on our girls’ team is that one potential relay line-up, because that is far from the case. Yes, we lost a lot of senior girls, but the only really big scorers that we lost were Clara Condon and Elodie Brox. Most of the rest of our State-runner-up Girl’s team has returned, including:
- Anastasia Garvey (SR) who dropped .48 seconds in 50 Free and .37 seconds in 50 Back leading off a relay.
- Philomena Kay (JR)
- Avila Mantooth (SO) who cut .08 seconds from her 200 Free PR, a nice feat this early in the season.
- Sophia Halisky (SO)
- Betsy Arnold (SO)
- Annie Dusek (SO) who jumped up to Varsity last year after an amazing level of improvement.
- Kyle Fifield (JR)
- Gabby Russo (JR)
Can our girls win another State Championship? I think we have a chance to win our 7th girls State title this year, and with the added scoring power of our girl’s diving team, I think we will be the team to beat in Division II next year!
Diving Continues to Get Better
I am very confident when I say that no high school in the State of Virginia has a Diving program like Seton, but as I am sure you have figured out by now, that doesn’t mean that I don’t think we should keep getting better.
Of all the great highlights from our meet on Saturday, what I saw from our Diving team may have been the greatest. Nearly every aspect of the program showed tremendous strides forward.
- Our Athletes – as Coach Keapproth will detail, below, I saw a group of divers that are already better than they were at the end of last season. I’ve never seen a group of so many divers dive so well at this very early point in the season.
- Our Judges – for a regular season meet, we have seven (7) trained judges scoring the meet with more qualified judges in the wings. A big part of this accomplishment was due to the leadership of Megan Edwards at Trinity Christian School who enlisted 40-year diving official Russ Jeffries from Northern Virginia to help guide us.
- Our Scorers – led by Coach Keapproth and Katie Condon, we are moving away from paper scoring to an electronic scoring system called DiveLive. I don’t think we are that far away from having a diving scoring system as sophisticated as our swimming scoring system where entries and scores are received electronically and results are tabulated and displayed electronically. No more paper dive sheets for entries and google sheets for scoring. I find this all to be very exciting.
I will let Coach Keapproth take over the story from here:
Great job in your first meet of the season yesterday! I was so impressed by the quality of diving, especially from the divers who took advantage of our off-season and pre-season training!
A few highlights on the girl’s side:
- Meghan Condon (10) took 1st with 174.75 points, only 3 points off of her own school record. She had an amazing front somersault with a full twist and inward 1.5 somersault. This score qualifies her for the State Championship!
- Maria Miller (12) finished 2nd with 151.60 points, which was a new personal record! She had an amazing front double somersault and reverse dive. This score qualifies her for the State Championship!
- Jane Judge (10) finished 3rd wirth 145.15 points. She wowed the judges with her grace and clean entries and also set a new personal record! This score qualifies her for the State Championship!
- Lucy Herwick (9) finished 4th with 132.85, crushing her prior personal record by over 10 points. She has worked incredibly hard in the off season to learn dives and increase her difficulty.
- Clare Kay (8) finished 5th with 130.15 points, close to her prior personal record. She performed an excellent front flip with a half twist, which was her highest scoring dive!
- Bella Gorman (8) finished 6th with 112.05 points. Bella is the only new diver in group 1 this year, and she rocked her first dive meet ever! She did an amazing front dive tuck and front somersault pike.
On the boy’s side:
- John Witter (8) finished 3rd with 134.75 points, less than a point off his personal record, and just shy of the State qualifying score. His back somersault and reverse dive earned high scores from the judges.
- Max Ashton (8) finished 4th with 110.65 points, crushing his personal record from last year by over 7 points. He performed a very nice inward dive, which was his highest scoring dive.
- Tom Waldron (10) finished 5th with 107.00 points. He performed a nice inward dive and inward somersault.
- Kenny Nguyen (11) finished 6th with 103.75 points. He performed a nice back somersault straight.
- Brian Orellana (10) finished 7th with 54.05 points, just a point off of his personal record. Brian has really been working hard this year to improve and learn dives to hopefully qualify for States.
As group 2 is focused on development, including solid and safe fundamental skills, special congratulations to the following divers:
- Congratulations to Molly Croson (8) for winning the girls 2-dive exhibition yesterday! She performed an especially amazing back dive!
- Congratulations to Will Judge (7) for winning the boys 2-dive exhibition yesterday, with the front 1.5 somersault that he has just learned the day prior!
- Congratulations to Clare Judge (9) for learning a front somersault.
- Congratulations to Cessie Reyes (9) for learning an inward dive.
- Congratulations to Mark Hartung (7) for learning a front somersault with a half twist.
- Congratulations to Caleb Neuhaus (8) for learning a front somersault with a half twist and a front 1.5 somersault.
So Many Other PRs!
Personal Records (aka PRs or lifetime best times) are THE key metric at Seton Swimming, and if that is the measure of success, then we were incredibly successful on Saturday – 137 new Personal Records. Last year we had 1,144 total PRs, and after just Time Trials and this meet, we are already at a total of 226.
We have already heard about some of the swimmers who had massive Personal Records (PRs) and breakout performances in their first meet of the season, but here are the other swimmers who had PRs this past weekend:
- Thomas Goodman (8) swam a 2.56 second PR in 50 Free and a 1.49 second PR in 100 Free.
- Emma Magness (7) cut .75 seconds from her 100 Free PR.
- Gabe Marm (SR) swam 50 Free 1.78 seconds faster than ever before.
- Sofia Reeves (7) had a huge drop of 4.99 seconds in 50 Free.
- Caroline Schroer (8) beat her previous PR in 100 Breast by .62 seconds.
- Christopher Schroer (6) cut 1.62 seconds in 50 Free
- Daniel Schroer (6) lowered his 50 Free PR by .14 seconds.
- Bethany Allen (7) dropped a huge 11.05 seconds in 100 Free to break 1:30 for the first time.
- Naomi Allen (6) cut 2.63 seconds from her 50 Free PR and 1.99 seconds from her 100 Free PR.
- Angela Andreu (SO) swam really well in 100 Free, beating her previous PR by 7.95 seconds
- Clara Bauer (7) had PRs in by both 50 Free and 100 Free, by 1.07 seconds and .73 seconds, respectively.
- Emma Beltran (8) cut a huge 7.35 seconds in 100 Free and 1.08 seconds in 50 Free.
- James Beltran (7) showed massive improvement in 100 Free, by 19.68 seconds, in 50 Free, by 3.24 seconds, and in 50 Back leading off a relay, by 6.62 seconds.
- Grace Catabui (8) dropped 3.08 seconds in 100 Free
- Anselm Clune (7) had a big 2.84 second drop in 50 Free.
- John Cooley (SO) beat his previous best time in 100 Free by .21 seconds.
- Katie Cooley (8) swam PRs in both 50 and 100 Free, by .83 seconds and 1.42 seconds, respectively.
- Lucas de Brey (7) looked great in 50 Free, beating his previous best by 5.02 seconds.
- Rafael De Micoli (SO) looked great during his .42 second PR swim in 50 Free and his 2.77 second PR swim in 100 Free.
- Charlie Dusek (SR) dropped a massive 7.36 seconds in 100 Free. He also dropped .15 seconds in 50 Free.
- Mary Elder (6) made her grandfather proud with a 9.35 second drop in 50 Free!
- Rose Ellis (SR) looked better than ever in 50 Back (by 2.64 seconds), 50 Free (by .57 seconds), and 100 Free (by 4.29 seconds).
- Leah Fifield (6) smiled her way to a 2.59 second PR in 50 Free.
- Luke Fifield (FR) managed to cut .13 seconds in 50 Free and 1.00 seconds in 100 Free despite issues with his goggles.
- Gigi Gibaldi (JR) had a good swim in 50 Free, beating her previous best by .34 seconds.
- Addi Hadro (8) had two (2) very strong swims, dropping 1.90 seconds in 50 Free and 4.68 seconds in 100 Free.
- Aoife Haggerty (JR) is off to a great start. After watching her perform in practice, it didn’t surprise me at all that she cut 2.43 seconds from her 100 Free PR.
- Eamon Haggerty (FR) had three great swims including a 3.22 second PR in 50 Free, a .99 second PR in 50 Free, and a 3.70 second PR in 100 Free.
- Oisin Haggerty (7) is not only showing he will one day be a great swimmer for Seton after a 7.40 second PR in 50 Free and a 4.55 second PR in 100 Free, he also wins my award for the best handshake in Class of 2031!
- Gus Halisky (7) must have been training in Italy, because he came back to swim a 2.90 second PR in 50 Free.
- Blaise Hallada (8) has figured out how to see his time on the scoreboard, which is a good thing since he dropped 2.72 seconds in 50 Free and 4.65 seconds in 100 Free. His coach, Shane Koehr told me that Blaise’s “stroke looked beautiful throughout his 50 free.”
- Camille Hallada (6) dropped 3.04 seconds in 50 Free.
- John Paul Hartung (FR) was amazing in his events where he dropped 14.55 seconds in the 100 Free and 8.84 seconds in the 50 Free. Coach “Duffy” (aka Shane Koehr) was very pleased.
- Mark Hartung (7) dropped a huge 7.40 seconds in 100 Free also.
- Charlie Hawley (7) took advantage of a good streamline to drop 1.68 seconds in 50 Free.
- Dominic Henry (SO) swam three (3) significant PRs, dropping 4.25 seconds in 50 Back, 2.98 seconds in 50 Free, and 9.16 seconds in 100 Free.
- Natalia Hercules (7) showed tremendous improvement in 50 and 100 Free, cutting 7.18 seconds and 10.13 seconds, respectively.
- Lucy Herwick (FR) lowered her 100 Free PR by another 3.70 seconds after improving her PR diving score by 13.75 points too.
- Emma Jolly (6) cut 6.08 seconds in 50 Free and .03 seconds in 100 Free.
- Jane Judge (SO) qualified for States in Diving with a great start to her season.
- William Judge (7) was not afraid of the 200 IM, and he proved it by swimming the event 29.14 seconds than ever before. He also cut 6.07 seconds in 100 Free.
- Connor Kay (6) beat his previous best time in 50 Free by 1.90 seconds.
- Colette Kramer (SR) had a great swim in 100 Free, beating her PR by 12.83 seconds. She also beat her PRs in 50 Free and 50 Back, by .22 seconds and 2.20 seconds, respectively.
- Cora Kramer (JR) dropped a huge 8.72 seconds in 100 Free and a big 3.49 seconds in 50 Free.
- Rebecca Kramer (8) looked very strong in 100 Free where she beat her PR by 9.32 seconds. He also beat her 50 Free PR by .50 seconds.
- Siobhan Maher (8) looked better than ever in 100 Free, and it showed with an 8.96 second PR. She also looked great for her 2.80 second PR in 50 Free.
- Julia Maranian (SO) dropped a massive 7.80 seconds in 100 Free.
- Heidi Mayer (6) made Coach Jeremy Kleb proud with her 22.45 second PR in 100 Free and her 4.79 second PR in 50 Free.
- Charlotte Meadows (FR) is showing that she will have a strong future with her 9.92 second PR in 200 IM and her .70 second PR in 100 Fly.
- James Nguyen (8) swam a PR every time he hit the water including a 6.29 second drop in 100 Free and a 1.44 second drop in 50 Free.
- Philip Nguyen (8) had an amazing 19.00 second PR in 100 Free plus drops in 50 Back (by 6.32 seconds) and 50 Free (by 1.77 seconds)
- Peter O’Malley (8) beat his previous best in 50 Free by 1.49 seconds and in 100 Free by .88 seconds.
- William Orellana (8) looked better than ever during his 10.04 second PR swim in 100 Free and his 3.72 second PR swim in 50 Free.
- Kolbe Partridge (6) is approaching that :30 second barrier in 50 Free after a .57 second drop. He also cut .19 seconds in 100 Free.
- Charbel “CJ” Pennefather (7) took on the top swimmers in the meet in the fast heat of 100 Back stroke and came 2.70 seconds closer than ever to beating all of them. He also swam 100 Free 3.87 seconds faster than he ever had before.
- Gianna Pillion (FR) cut 6.90 seconds in 100 Free and .98 seconds in 50 Free.
- Allison Quispe (SR) beat her previous best in 100 Free by 3.10 seconds and in 50 Free by .39 seconds.
- Therese Rehman (6) had a great 50 Free, swimming the event 1.73 seconds faster than just a couple of weeks ago.
- James Reynolds (FR) dropped a huge 7.07 seconds in 100 Free.
- Dominic Sciscilo (7) cut 8.29 seconds in 100 Free.
- Bella Vaughan (FR) beat her 100 Free PR by 5.25 seconds and her 50 Free PR by .91 seconds.
- Jane Vaughan (7) dropped almost 13 seconds (12.99 actually) in 100 Free.
- Noah Vaughan (JR) cut a whopping 3.47 seconds in 50 Free.
- Lily Waldron (SO) lowered her 100 Fly PR by 3.60 seconds and her 100 Breast PR by 6.89 seconds. Those are big drops Lily!
- Joce Wilson (7) showed great improvement on Saturday, lowering her 50 Free PR by 4.53 seconds and her 100 Free PR by 4.18 seconds.
- Joe Witter (SO) looked great in everything he swam including his 2.75 second PR in 50 Free (to go 28.70!), his 1.03 second PR in 50 Back, and his 1.98 second PR in 100 Free.
“Last Ones Up”
It would be hard to be more pleased with what I saw on Saturday. Our work with our underwaters was clearly evident. We have made great strides, but we are not quite there yet – especially off turns when we are tired.
Let’s keep getting better here.
Two other areas where I see an opportunity to improve:
- Finishes
- We haven’t gotten to Finishes in our stroke technique work at practice yet, but when we do, you are going to hear me repeatedly say, “Never, never, never, never ….. never finish the race by grabbing the top of the gutter”
- When you finish a race, you should reach for the touchpad with your head down, and touch the pad below the surface of the water.
- Not only will that ensure that your time is recorded properly, it is also the fastest way to finish.
- Missed Events
- We had only three (3) swimmers miss their event without me personally knowing about it in advance. Unfortunately, one (1) of them was experienced swimmers.
- For our first meet, that is not too bad, but I just want it to be clear on these points:
- This is a high school swim team, so you all should be responsible enough to get to where you are supposed to be in time for your event.
- If you feel like you can’t swim the event, you need to talk to me.
- Treating Your Relay Teammates as Your Teammates
- I encourage you all to read my short blog entry called “Imagine”. It will take less than 60 seconds to read.
And as I conclude here, let me take this opportunity clarify two times when the whole team will gather together during each meet:
- Team Meeting Before the Meet – right after we conclude our warm-up session, everyone will return to the bleachers, get their uniforms on, and reconvene in the hallway outside of the racquetball courts for a pre-meet team meeting. At the meeting, we will start with a team prayer and discuss our goals for the Meet.
- Post-Meet Handshake – At the beginning of the first heat of the Boys 400 Free Relay, the entire team should be on deck and in uniform to cheer for the final two relays. That way, as soon as the last heat of girls finishes, we can show our gratitude to the officials, timers and our competitors by marching around the pool for the post-meet handshake.
I had a few interesting conversations with swimmers who wanted to leave the meet early because they were done swimming. Fortunately, the swimmers with whom I was speaking have played other sports so I was able to frame the issue in a way that they could clearly understand. Imagine you are at the end of the bench with your team for a football, baseball, basketball, hockey or soccer game, and you know you are done playing. Would it ever be OK for you to head to the locker room before the game ended?
Our Annual Homecoming Meet
Two Saturday’s from now, on December 20th, is our annual Homecoming Meet at the Freedom Center. 1st warm-up starts at 1:00 p.m. and the first event goes off at 2:08 p.m.
As we have in the past, we’ll be running some alumni relays along with our own scoring relays. I hope to see the Wilson Brothers there again with a family relay, and I hope that some of the seniors from last year are back to compete against our current relays. I’ve also heard that Coach Kevin Koehr and Coach Zadnik might be putting together a relay.
If you know of other alumni, please make sure they know they are welcome. If they show up with a suit and goggles, I’ll try to get them in a medley relay and an exhibition heat of 50 Free. It would be very helpful if I knew in advance that they were coming.
Christmas Break Practices
Traditionally, every Christmas Break, we have practices at the Freedom Center for the Varsity swimmers who will be scoring in the key Conference and Championship meets starting in January.
Since we don’t yet know who is on the Varsity team, in general, this means Group 1 and 2 Swimmers who were entered as a scoring swimmer in one of the December meets. That means that most of the swimmers who practice with Coach Bohman, Coach Kay, and Coach Schroer should plan on attending.
Everyone else can take the Christmas holiday off. I know that some of you want to swim, but we won’t have enough lanes or enough coaches to accommodate any more kids. So, if you are not Varsity, relax and enjoy Christmas – then come back ready for the push to the January 24th JV Invitational at the WARF.
For Diving, Coach Keapproth will announce her expectations for attendance over the break.
I’m still finalizing the schedule, but I am anticipating practices from 9:00 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. for swimming and 10:30 to 11:30 a.m. for Diving on:
- Monday, December 2nd
- Friday, December 26th
- Monday, December 29th
- Friday, January 2nd
Our Christmas practice schedule is posted on the Team Calendar on www.setonswimming.org
Also remember that we have the Cystic Fibrosis Swim-a-thon on Wednesday, December 31st from 10:00 to 1:00 p.m. at the Freedom. I have more information posted on that shortly.
If you are in town, please plan on being at these practices and the Swim-a-thon. I’m sure that Trinity Christian and Oakcrest will be working hard.
We’re off to a great start this season – great job! We’ve got two more December meets on the next Saturdays. Expect to swim something different in those two meets.
See you at practice,
Coach Jim Koehr