Sophomore competes in state meet by | Sarah Stertzbach
S
ophomore Jake Johnson took his position on the starting block. As the buzzer sounded, he dived into the pool, his mind focused on his race. He did not pay attention to the swimmers around him, just the end of his lane. Moments later, he stood next to the pool with a towel wrapped around him and waited to see his time and what place he had finished. Last year as a freshman, Johnson broke school records in the 100-yard backstroke and the 200-yard freestyle. This year, at the regional meet in Mooresville, Johnson achieved a second place finish in the 100-yard backstroke with a time of 53.15 and a third place finish in the 200yard freestyle with a time of 1:48.14. He broke his own school record both times. “Jake is a monster in the water,” junior swim team member Ari Sen said. ““His technique is perfect and every time he goes off the block he gets a sizeable lead and keeps it.” Johnson attributes much of his success to his practice routine. Since Johnson is also on the YMCA of Western North Carolina Piranhas swim team with freshman Rebekah Littauer, he attends both practice sessions. During the recent school season, he practiced with his Falcon team about once a week to make time for both teams. “We swim every morning before school and every afternoon after school,” Johnson said. “We do a lot of land training with about 30 minutes
Dylan Buchanan, 11
of ab work, and then get in the pool and do some drill work.” When last year’s seniors graduated, the varsity swim team lost a strong group of swimmers, including Connor Courtney, Suzanne English and Kiley Wooten. This season there are only two seniors, Arielle Blake and Victoria Sellers. “This team has improved since last year’s squad,” Head Coach Eric Hyder said. “We lost a lot in our graduating seniors last year, but we recovered with a strong freshman class and excellent leadership from our team captains, Victoria Sellers and Arielle Blake.” During the regular season, which ended in late January, the women’s swim team finished fourth in the conference meet and the men’s team finished third. Both teams faced competition from schools with twice as many swimmers, including T.C. Roberson and Carolina Day. Swimmers who qualified for the regional meet in individual events included Blake in the 50-yard freestyle, Littauer in the 100-yard butterfly and 100-yard breaststroke and juniors Taylor Johnson in the 100-yard backstroke, Andrew Guffey in the 100-yard breaststroke and Levi Gibbs in the 500-yard freestyle. Also qualifying for the relay teams were junior Mackenzie Keel, junior Bailey Austin, freshman Maddee Pennock, sophomore Emily Treadway, Sellers and sophomores George Tsakalos, and Gavin Blake. Johnson was the only team member to advance to the state meet in Raleigh.
“My favorite thing about the student section is when they come to the games and support us. They get pretty rowdy, and that gets the team energized.”
22 | sports | wingspan | february 2015
Tristan Thomas, 11
“It makes a big difference when we have a good student section. It’s pretty intimidating for the other team to come into our school and have people yelling at them.”
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Logan Wyant, 10
“The student section really made a difference in the game against Franklin by staying in the game the whole time and staying with us when we were down.”