The Kenyon College Lords swimming and diving team hosted Saturday its annual Fast Chance Invitational, a series of scheduled events followed by time trials in which participants try to shave seconds off their best times in order to jockey for qualifying positions in the upcoming NCAA Division III Championship.
While Kenyon already looked to be in good shape for nationals, the Lords put up some speedy times Saturday and wound up recording 14 NCAA ‘B’ cut times. Of those 14 cuts, five improved upon their season-best outputs.
In the scheduled individual events, senior Ambert Sawaya got things started for the Lords. He posted a season-best and ‘B’ cut time of 1:39.79 in the 200-yard freestyle. Shortly after that, sophomore Humphrey Pruett put up a ‘B’ time of 56.39 in the 100-yard breaststroke. He wasn’t done there, though. Pruett later swam a time trial in the same event and cut back his time to a season-best 56.32.
Continuing on through the time trials, junior Gabriel Bellott-McGrath cranked out a 1:39.78 for a season-best and ‘B’ cut in the 200-yard freestyle. Right after that, sophomore Brooks McCoy rang up a season-best and ‘B’ cut in the 400-yard individual medley time trial. He clocked in at 3:56.23.
In diving action, sophomore Ryder Sammons earned a qualifying score of 460.28 on the one-meter board and senior Derek Hoare posted a qualifying score of 445.28 on the three-meter board.
The list of Kenyon swimmers who clipped ‘B’ cuts, but couldn’t quite improve upon their season-bests included Matthew Cooper (50.14), Oscar Anderson (49.80) and Alex Swaim (50.32) in the 100-yard backstroke; Liam Moran (1:49.82) and Colin Reardon (1:49.76) in the 200-yard backstroke; and Fritz Josephson (15:55.91) in the 1,650-yard freestyle.
Way back at the start of the meet, Kenyon’s 200-yard freestyle relay team of Weston Carpenter, Austin Pu, Ben Baturka and A.J. Reid put up the Lords’ first ‘B’ cut time of the day with a 1:22.09.
The schedule ahead has Kenyon divers participating in the regional qualifier next weekend. After that, the Lords gear up for the NCAA Championship, which will begin March 15 in Shenandoah, Texas.
News courtesy Kenyon Athletics.
There were actually some outstanding swims at this Fast Chance meet by swimmers from a number of teams. Look out for Denison and Kenyon to show up with strong squads at the NCAAs.