We experienced our marathon swim weekend.
It started with quals on Wednesday night. Julia set personal records in all the events she swam - breast, fly, and free. We knew she would be in Champs for three relays, but she had to prove herself in the individual events. She came in second in the free by .02 of a second. She impressed her coaches in the butterfly, but there was some confusion about that race, so we walked away from quals thinking she did not make that event. We were greeted as soon as we showed up for practice the next day by a very upset coach. He did not realize until after leaving the meet that girls who finished behind Julia in the butterfly made Champs, and she did not. He had already been burning up his phone requesting a review of that race. It turned out that swimmers who were not even at quals made Champs in that one, so they had to figure out what went wrong with the times. In the end Julia came in 8th which put her in the consolation heat for Champs. She came in fifth in the back, so she qualified for three events (the maximum number of individual events allowed) in Champs.
They are the hurricane, so the coaches wrote "category 5" on their arms to show their support for quals. Julia decided to do the same, but clearly her spelling needs some work. I do like the "glory" though.
On Friday night we enjoyed the pep rally.
We were up very early and sporting temporary team tattoos for the Champs meet.
The swimmers headed out in style.
They formed a tunnel to greet their coaches as they arrived.
The team went on to take second place making it the first time the team has been knocked off the top in sixteen years. Julia finished first in the free, and she was disappointed that the girl who beat her in quals did not appear at Champs. Julia wanted to go up against her again. This victory is huge because Julia only swims in the summer, but she competes against swimmers who swim year round. That's how strong she is. She finished fifth in back and eighth (the best she could do in her heat) in the fly. Her relay teams all finished first.
We left Champs and got a few hours of a break in the afternoon before heading to a pool party to celebrate.
The kids did the hurricane, and even some parents got in on the action- such fun!
On Sunday we started the banquet at 2:00, and it lasted until 10:00.
Wyatt received "most dedicated." He's not fond of being on the swim team and really isn't competitive in this sport, but he was so close to a quals time in his breast stroke. I so enjoy watching his breast stroke as it is really good. He won't swim next year, and I will miss that.
Julia received her medals for Champs and was awarded the Coaches' award.
She took it upon herself to wear make-up to the banquet. Can you tell?
We ended the banquet with a dance party -good times, good times!
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