A strong performance by Fluvanna County’s girls in the final race of the day, the 400-meter freestyle relay, kept it from being a sweep.
But that was the only thing that didn’t go Western Albemarle’s way as the defending Group AA champions rolled to a Jefferson District title while winning 11 of 12 events on the day. Western piled up 296 points to second place Charlottesville’s 152 points in the JD meet.
“We went in knowin we needed to try hard and we knew it was going to be the last meet for a lot of our swimmers and we wanted to support them,” said Western’s Seana Acker, who earned Jefferson District swimmer of the year honors after the meet ended.
Acker won the 200-meter IM, led Western to a win in the 200-medley relay, won the 100-freestyle and swam a leg of the 200-freestyle relay that also won to five Acker four total first places.
Her teammate, Natalie Cronk, nearly matched the feat with a trio of event titles, swimming on the same 200-freestyle relay champs while also winning the 200-meter freestyle and the 100-breaststroke individually. Elsa Strickland won the 50-free for the Warriors. Freshman star Remedy Rule rolled to an eight-second victory in the 100-butterfly, Anna Corley won the 400-freestyle (while also placing second in the 200-IM) and Katie Lesemann took the 100-backstroke. On Friday, Katherine Sheppard won the dive portion of the meet as Western’s depth ruled the day.
The Warriors got a solid boost from a handful of Western swimmers who were just outside the Group AA cuts picking up key marks early in the day. Keller Whitlock’s second place swim in the 50-free, for one, qualified the freshman for the state meet.
“We had Keller qualify for states and a couple of people qualify for regionals because they finished in the top five,” Acker said. “It’s nice to see some of the younger members of the team taking the first step in their first championship season.”
While Fluvanna’s 400-freestyle relay team was the only squad to top Western in an event, a number of other swimmers put together strong outings. Charlottesville’s Anna Perry, had a pair of runner-up finishes for the Black Knights, taking second in the 200-meter and 400-meter freestyle events. Madeline Keach took second in the 100-fly for Charlottesville. Charlotte Keeley took second in the 100-back and fifth in the 50-free to bolster the Black Knights’ second place performance in the team standings. Emily Keeley grabbed a third in the 100-free.
For third place Fluvanna, Lauren Cabrera took second in the 100-free and fourth in the 100-backstroke. She also swam relay legs on the event winning 400-freestyle team that also included Yvonne Smith, Carly Csapo and Alena Billingsley and the second place 200-medley squad. Morgan Reynard replaced Billingsley in that grouping in the 200-medley. Reynard also grabbed a second place in the 100-breaststroke for the Flucos.
Monticello’s 200-meter freestyle relay team swam an incredible race to take fourth, slicing eight seconds off the squad’s time to make the Group AA cut. Kristen Grimshaw, Olivia Bascle, Shannon Simko and Mary Elam combined in that effort.
The Region II meet is slated for Saturday at in Warrenton.
