The Petersburg High School swim team competed in an invitational meet Oct. 15-16 in Juneau. The team has only two events left in their season—the regional and state swim meets. KFSK’s Angela Denning reports:
At the pool, Head Coach Andy Carlisle, directs the swimmers in their warmups. He’s been pushing them hard the last few weeks. Next week is the regional meet and practices will be easier leading up to that.
“The goal is Regions so instead of resting for all these meets that really don’t affect what happens at regions–like we don’t have to qualify to get to regions, we’re just there–so, we can train through those things. . .and we do,” Carlisle said.
The Juneau swim meet included teams from Juneau Douglas, Thunder Mountain, Ketchikan, Sitka, Craig, Haines, and Wrangell. These are the same teams Petersburg will compete against at Regions. Swimming has no separate divisions for school size. All schools in the region—from little to big—compete.
So, the Juneau meet was a good indicator. Carlisle says his team did well.
“They did pretty darn good,” Carlisle said. “We worked really hard the week before. We didn’t rest at all going into it. So, anybody who got a best time, that’s pretty impressive. Everyone swam really well. Better than I expected after the week we had.”
Petersburg senior, Allie Morgan, is the only Lady Viking swimming this year. In Juneau, she took third place in the 50 yard freestyle on Friday with a time of 26.31 seconds. In the 100 yard freestyle event, Morgan took 4th place on Friday and 2nd place on Saturday, her fastest time being 57.41 seconds. Morgan also took 9th place in the 100 yard backstroke on Saturday with a time of 1 min. 8 seconds.
“I’m happy I’m getting faster but also I’m a little disappointed because I’m like three seconds off of my best time still. And I don’t know, that’s frustrating because we put so much hard work in the pool,” Morgan said. “But I guess it’s to be expected because we’re pushing it really hard and once we taper hopefully the time will get faster.”
Morgan’s goal is to qualify for state. To qualify, swimmers need to be the fastest in their region or in the top 12 fastest in the rest of the state.
She feels pretty good about her prospects.
“I think I’m going to make it, hopefully,” Morgan said. “I think for the events I’m going to do, I think I’ll make it.”
Senior Caleb Pfundt took 7th place in the 100 backstroke on Friday and 9th in the event Saturday, finishing in 1 minute 5 seconds both times. He also took 8th place in the 200 yard freestyle on Saturday at 2 minutes 10 seconds. In the 100 freestyle, Pfundt took 8th place on Friday.
He says he’s happy with his results.
“All of my events well really well, dropped a good amount of time,” Pfundt said. “I did the 100 free and 100 back, dropped over two seconds in each of them, I can’t remember. I did 200 free but only dropped a couple seconds in that. But it was good for me.”
Senior Sean Spiegelmyre took 3rd place in the boys 100 yard backstroke on Saturday and 6th place in the event on Friday. His best time was 1 min. 2 seconds. In the 100 freestyle, Spiegelmyre finished 6th on Friday and 13th on Saturday, his best time was 54.17 seconds.
“Juneau for me went really well for me the second day, it went terribly the first day,” Spiegelmyre said. “I gained some time on my backstroke, I dropped a little bit of time on my free but it wasn’t what I wanted. But the second day I dropped two seconds and my free is a low 54 so I’m pretty happy with those times.”
Spiegelmyre’s goal this year is to make it to State but he’s not sure if it will happen. He’s hoping his times improve next week when practices ease up.
Oliver Peterson finished 9th place in the 100 backstroke at 1 minute, 12 seconds. He also took 6th place in the 200 yard freestyle on Friday with a time of 2 minutes 12 seconds.
In the 100 yard freestyle event on Friday, Elijah Whitacre took 9th at 56.69 seconds. Rik Cumps took 14th at 58.47 seconds and Logan Haley took 19th at 1 minute 8 seconds.
In the 50 yard freestyle on Friday, Elijah Whitacre took 12th place in 25.52 seconds and Rik Cumps took 13th in 25.91 seconds. Logan Haley finished 21st at 30.30 seconds and Cayden Turland took 25th at 36.86 seconds. On Saturday, Peterson took 14th place in the 50 free with a time of 26.88 seconds.
The boys swam competed in some relay events as well.
Next up for the swim team is Regions in Ketchikan the last weekend in October. Coach Carlisle says the swimmers should eat well and get enough sleep.
“We won’t stop swimming but we’ll back off on the intensity and stuff next week,” Carlisle said. “And hopefully everybody will be real sharp.”
After Regions, it’s the state meet in Anchorage.
