Girls Varsity Swim Rocks the Block

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Lillian Zuelke, Reporter

 

The Spring Lake Girls’ Swim and Dive team had a home meet against Holland on September 27th. Spring Lake won the meet by just over 60 points: the score was 123 to 62. The Holland team was relatively small compared to Spring Lake’s team, but this was still an impressive win. Hannah Brown swam the 200 freestyle for the first time since middle school and dropped 25 seconds with a 2:13:14. Delany Meyers dropped two seconds in the 50 freestyle and got a 28:29. Ava Taw dropped three seconds in the 100 freestyle with a 1:12:89. 

Coach Hannah Boes commented, “The energy was high and as we’re going into a big weekend, I am excited to see how we’ll progress as a team and at the meet on Saturday.” Boes referenced the girls’ upcoming invitational meet that took place on the day of the homecoming dance at Holland Christian. She thinks that this meet indicated an increase in both team growth and spirit. 

The girls had a team dinner afterward where they celebrated their win and reflected on the evening. When asked about the meet, the girls decided to speak of their difficulties when it came to the 500-meter freestyle swim event. The 500 is notorious for being not only a challenging event to swim, but also tough to keep track of how many meters the swimmer has swum. A teammate will “card” for the swimmer where they hold a sign underwater that says how many laps the person has accomplished thus far. The principle may sound simple; however, there are a few rules that make carding a tedious and sometimes confusing job. Jessica Stewart was one of the girls who carded at the meet. She said, “I liked talking to the girl from the other team next to me during the 500 . . . Neither of us knew what we were doing.” Ava Fouchea, another carder, sarcastically stated, “I enjoyed getting yelled at by the official for counting the 500 wrong.” Carding the 500 incorrectly may cause the swimmer to become disqualified–a big fear among all teammates who take on the responsibility of carding. When speaking of a previous meet, Renee Geschiere remarked, “I bawled my eyes out while carding for Rhyan because I thought I disqualified her.” Fortunately, she didn’t actually disqualify her teammate and successfully helped her through the 500. When swimming the event herself during this recent meet, Geschiere mentioned that the official called her “the outside smoker.” This is a phrase that is used when a swimmer beats everyone around them even though they are swimming in a lane at the end of the pool. So, even though the girls struggle with carding the 500, they seem to be adept at swimming it! 

Overall, the meet against Holland was a grand achievement for Spring Lake’s swimmers. They are planning on continuing their success throughout the remainder of their season and have high hopes for the outcomes of their future meets.