PIRANHAS SHOW MAJOR IMPROVEMENTS AT EASTERN COM. CHAMPS
Combined Team Scores - Through Event 96 1. Riverside Aquatics Association 3949.5 2. Mesa Aquatics Swimming 3159 3. Redlands Swim Team 2131 4. Circle City Aquatics 1666 5. Temecula Swim Club 1540 6. Piranha Swim Team 1269 7. The Claremont Club 1183 8. Palm Desert Swim Club 774 9. Fontana Aquatics Club 730 10. Star Aquatics 524.5 11. Corona Swim Team 457.5 12. Hillside Aquatic Team 312 13. Chino Hills Aquatics 222 14. Unattached 187.5 15. Yucaipa Swim Team 166 16. Moreno Valley Aquatics 74 17. East Highlands Ranch Dolphin S 73 18. Leaping Lionfish 72 19. Hemet Valley Dolphins 51 20. Desert Aquatics 48 21. Hardcore Swimming of Riverside 37
The Eastern Committee Super JO Max meet hosted by RAA was yet another big step for the Piranha swimmers and the Piranha Swim Team as a whole. With our best swimmers not swimming their best events based on the "max" designation, the Piranhas used our depth and quality swimming at the next level to lead us through the competition. The combination of our next generation of Super JO qualifiers and our current team leaders swimming off events resulted in our third consecutive championship meet with results verifying our improvement. In 2013 this meet was split but we would have finished 10th if combined. This year our club moved up 4 spots, beating several teams larger than us and with more entries in the meet. What's most impressive is we did this in a year where we also had more Super JO swims not eligible for this meet.
Our 10 and under swimmers were lead by Emilea Lockhart and Caleb Vanbuskirk. Emilea's huge time drops from just three weeks ago resulted in a 9th place and 10th place finish in the breastroke events. Caleb's 50 free was also a time improvement from the Festival meet. Caleb was joined by Brody Najedly-Krall, Liam Kean, and Corbin Hewett in the 200 Medley Relay.
MIchael O'Neill, Cody Meyer, Emma Johansen, Matt Dore, Naomi Asencio, and Tenoch Sanchez led the 11-12 swimmers with several scoring swims and best times that are showing progress towards the next level. Kelli Andrade took gold medals in two of her "off" backstroke events while swimming for the second weekend in a row. The 11-12 boys relay of Michael, Cody, Matt, and Tenoch won Gold in both the medley and free relays. This is the first time in a long time any Piranha Boys relay has won at a championship meet. The boys B team also entered the top 8. The team of Anthony Gutierrez, Julian Trinidad, Conner Gutierrez, and Devin Richardson finished 5th in both the medley and free relays.
Desiree Lewis was our leading 13-14 swimmer and earned finals swims in all 6 of her events including a huge 6 second drop in the 100 breastroke. Christian Meyer had a breakthrough meet, scoring in three of his events and for the first time ever making a championship final. Christian was joined by Cy Mendoza, Luis Ruiz, and Jonathen Escoto a 200 free relay that finished in the top 10. Desiree was joined by Jordan Nadler, Mary Turley, and Emilia Brady for both relays that finished in scoring spots.
Alissah Koochaki joined our Super JO girls to lead the 15-18 age group swimmers. Besides being a part of the gold medal wining 200 medley relay, Alissah's 7 second time improvement in the 200 fly was the best of her 5 scoring swims. Faith Travis, Kat Wickham, Shelby Andrade, and Alexa Wasserman competed in their second championship meet weekend in a row and did not disappoint. All four girls showed versatility with substantial time drops in their "off" events while proving the quality of their trainiing by doing it on a second taper.
Bryce Ramos earned four finals swims to lead our 15-18 boys group, three of those being championship finals swims. Josh Purificacion was the teams most improved swimmer with time improvements that have him in a position to soon earn JO cuts as well as qualify for CIF. In perhaps the swim of the meet, longtime Piranha Richard Tomlin dropped almost a full minute in the 1650 free to finish 5th and earn his first JO qualifying time. What's most remarkable is that before this season Richard had not reached the Blue level.
Great job by our Piranha swimmers. Great support from our Piranha parents. Success doesn't happen over night. This meet capped a short course season that was a big improvement from the last year, but more importantly, proof that with hard work comes results. Keep it up Piranhas!
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