The Pagosa Springs High School Lady Pirate swim team logged one of its best meets of the season so far at the Montrose High School Girls Invitational on Friday, Jan. 16.
“We had one of our best meets of the season in Montrose,” wrote coach Heather Miller in an email to The SUN. “We had many best times and many were big drops.”
Another highlight of the meet for the Lady Pirates was the 200-yard freestyle relay qualifying for state with a time of two minutes, 00.09 seconds. The state cut for that race is 2:02.00.
The first event of the meet was the 200-yard medley relay. The Lady Pirates had two teams competing. The team of Marlowe Hedgecock, Leah Blackman, Chloe Gantt and Asia Gorman placed fifth and swam a 2:18.75. The team of Ruby Snell, Leilani Snell, Natalia Monterroso and Brooklyn Trujillo was disqualified.
The next event, the 200-yard freestyle, saw eight Lady Pirates compete. The top finisher was Gorman, who swam a personal 2:26.50, dropping 1.64 seconds and placing seventh. Gianna Shaeffer placed 13th and swam a personal best 2:38.74, dropping 2.53 seconds. Grace Cram was the next Lady Pirate to finish, swimming a 2:42.10 and placing 16th. Cheyenne Trujillo swam a 3:12.33 and placed 22nd.
The next three girls all dropped more than 17 seconds off their previous personal bests in the 200-yard freestyle: Avery Book swam a 3:12.44, placed 23rd and dropped 22.72 seconds. Kailey Vincent swam a 3:13.23, placed 24th and dropped 17.03 seconds. Isabela Forster swam a 3:37.12, placed 26th and dropped 24 seconds. Arya Patel was the final Lady Pirate to compete in the event, swimming a 3:53.44 and placing 27th.
The next event was the 200-yard individual medley. Gantt swam a 2:47.89 in and finished sixth. Blackman swam a 3:21.80 and finished 12th, dropping 0.20 seconds off her previous best time. Angela Gomez and Monterroso were both disqualified.
The Lady Pirates had six swimmers compete in the 50-yard freestyle. The top finisher was Hedgecock, who swam a 21.67 and placed 15th. Katelyn Fricke swam a 32.31 and placed 17th. Ruby Snell swam a personal best 32.39, dropping 3.96 seconds and placing 18th. Leilani Snell also swam a personal best time of 32.85, dropping 0.22 seconds and placing 20th. Brooklyn Trujillo swam a 36.99 and placed 32nd, and Lucia Rivera swam a 40.11 and placed 37th.
Gomez was the only Lady Pirate who swam the 100-yard butterfly. She placed ninth, swimming a 1:44.66.
Every single swimmer in the 100-yard freestyle swam a personal best. Gantt was the top finisher, dropping 0.47 seconds and placing fifth with a time of 1:05.19. Shaeffer placed 13th, dropping 16.66 seconds en route to her personal-best swim of 1:11.77. Fricke dropped 0.70 seconds and placed 16th, swimming a 1:13.52. Ruby Snell swam a 1:17.64, dropping 5.92 seconds and placing 22nd. Book swam a 1:26.40, dropping 0.78 seconds and placing 30th. Vincent swam a 1:27.85, dropping 5.57 seconds and placing 31st.
There were six swimmers who competed in the 500-yard freestyle. Cram swam a 7:09.66 and placed ninth, Monterroso swam a 8:20.98 and placed 11th, Leilani Snell swam a 8:36.44 and placed 12th, Brooklyn Trujillo swam a 8:56.10 and placed 13th, Cheyenne Trujillo swam a 8:59.39 and placed 14th, and Forster swam a 10:06.94 and placed 15th.
The 200-yard freestyle relay was next. The team of Hedgecock, Shaeffer, Gorman and Gantt qualified for state with their time of 2:00.09. They also placed fifth at the meet. The team of Blackman, Gomez, Fricke and Cram placed 10th with a time of 2:16.54. The team of Patel, Book, Rivera and Vincent placed 14th with a time of 2:40.53.
Patel was the only Lady Pirate to compete in the 100-yard backstroke. She swam a 2:17.99 and placed 22nd.
Blackman was the top Lady Pirate finisher in the 100-yard breaststroke, swimming a 1:30.96 and placing 11th. Hedgecock swam a personal best 1:33.18, dropping 2.09 seconds and placing 14th. Gorman swam a personal best 1:44.25, dropping 12.65 seconds and placing 25th. Rivera swam a personal best 1:51.12, dropping 0.28 seconds and placing 28th.
The final event of the meet for the Lady Pirates was the 100-yard freestyle relay. The team of Ruby Snell, Shaeffer, Gomez and Cram swam a 5:06.81 and placed sixth. The team of Fricke, Monterroso, Book and Leilani Snell swam a 5:23.68 and placed seventh. The team of Cheyenne Trujillo, Forster, Brooklyn Trujillo and Vincent swam a 6:01.59 and placed 10th.
This Friday, Jan. 23, the Lady Pirates will be competing in Gunnison for the second time this year.
“For Gunnison we will continue some endurance work but with a bit more focus on sprinting and race strategy,” wrote Miller. “We will also focus a little more on starts and turns since we did have a few mistakes in Montrose.”
jsellner@orourkemediagroup.com
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