The winter and spring training season resulted in a strong championship showing for the Blue Dolfins. Across the country, USA Swimming teams place a priority on the following goals: 1) to have fun and enjoy swimming, 2) to help young swimmers learn to set goals and see how persistence directly relates to those goals, 3) to help athletes find the value of hard work, and 4) to help athletes learn to use swim meets to measure their progress toward their goals. This training season, we worked hard on all four of these priorities.
Training for Championship Meets
Each training season concludes with a championship meet for each age group. Winter and early Spring training place an emphasis on training short course (25 yards instead of the Olympic distance of 50 meters) and the Florida Age Group Championships and Senior Championships are the big meets to conclude this training season.
Florida Age Group Championships (FLAGs - Ages 14 and Under)
Starting with our youngest swimmers, Flippers and Fins coaches Erin, Maya, and Kailey as well as Junior Coaches Ryan and Jackson, helped a record number of athletes qualify for FLAGs. Seven swimmers from the Winter Park branch headed to Jacksonville to compete with the best age groupers in the state: Caitlin Bartle, Karen Hoefler, Emmy Maguire, Ben Rines, Will Rines, Isaac Tindall, and Jacob Tindall.
At the meet, several best times were reached and multiple swimmers competed in the finals, scoring lots of team points. Along with the Oviedo branch, the boy’s team finished 9th overall while the girls finished 12th, giving a combined team finish of 11th.
Florida All-Star Meet
Those swimmers who finish in the top 6 of their event at FLAGs are invited to represent Florida Swimming and compete at an All-Star meet, held at Indian River State College. Special congrats go to Caitlin and Ben for advancing to the Florida All-Star Meet.
There Caitlin was a top-three finisher in the 100 Back, 200 Free, 200 IM, 100 Fly, and 100 Free and helped her team win the Girls 200 Medley Relay. Ben competed in several events and also helped his relay teams finish 4th in both the Boys 200 Medley and Mixed 200 Medley Relays.
Senior Championships (15 and Older)
Senior Champs is always a big meet the senior athletes gear up for each season. Readjusting to the winter training season is always a bit tough after the mental high of high school season. This year the Dolfin athletes overcame and did quite well with a very short training cycle. Coach Joe is proud of the following girls who qualified for Senior Champs held here in Orlando: Lockett Bowley, Caroline Chasser, Stella Chicles, Claire Clark, Sophie Cox, Elle Gindlesperger, Erika Hirschmann, Sadie Jahn, Adrianna Lojewski, Bella Lojewski, Emmy Maguire (who competed in the open division), Gabby Puryear-Lynch, Ava Rines, and Cami Semmen.
Joe is also proud of the boy’s team, which included: Connor Bryant, Ian Heysen, Mão Pedroza, Brock Tanner, and Will Wertenberger.
Below is a snippet of Caroline and Elle competing in the 200 Fly consolation finals.
The Winter Park and Oviedo branch combined to help the Blue Dolfins women win the team award! The Dolfins finished second in the combined team award while the men finished 7th. Many swimmers had good drops in time, and for those who didn’t, we step back and look at the trajectory of their times over several months to be sure the 12-18 month trend-line is always moving in the correct direction toward faster times. Everyone seems to be moving the right way!
National Meets
Several of our senior athletes also qualified to compete in national-level meets, going up against college level and Olympic swimmers, including Katie Ledecky and Caeleb Dressel. One Blue Dolfin swimmer even set a new Americas Record! (See below.)
TYR Pro Swim Series
The Winter Park branch took 4 swimmers to San Antonio, Texas to compete in the spring TYR Pro Series. Lockett Bowley, Caroline Chasser, Bella Lojewski, and Cami Semmen jumped in the water to face off against the best swimmers in the world. Coach Joe was especially proud of several of the girls making it through preliminaries to compete in the evening finals. Bella and Caroline both competed in the B Finals, while Lockett finished 7th in the A Finals of the 200 Fly.
Joe explains the main benefit of competing at these high-level meets is the experience: “The girls had a great experience seeing how the pros and high-level collegiate athletes are preparing, warming up, and swimming their races. Hopefully, they will remember these experiences and use them the next time they swim and prep in their own meets.”
Journeys Classic Swim Meet
Senior swimmer Lauren Bergquist swam in the Journeys Classic meet at the Rosen Aquatic & Fitness Center here in Orlando. There, she set yet another record! She set a new Down Syndrome International Swim Organisation Senior Americas Region Record for the 50 Breastroke. We couldn’t be more proud of Lauren and she has become the Blue Dolfins’ most decorated swimmer, holding the most American Records, in Blue Dolfins history! Congrats!
Long Course Training Begins
While our youngest swimmers will continue to train short course, our older swimmers now begin to place an emphasis in training long course (50 meters), to prepare for the summer long course championships. While fast times are always on our radar, our main team goals go back to the four emphasized above: 1) to have fun and enjoy swimming, 2) to help young swimmers learn to set goals and see how persistence directly relates to those goals, 3) to help athletes find the value of hard work, and 4) to help athletes learn to use swim meets to measure their progress toward their goals.
Thank you, parents, for helping us work on team goals for our swimmers!