Swimmers make a splash at Stayton

Sisters High School swimmers made a strong statement at Stayton in a non-scoring, four-way meet on Saturday, December 18.

The Cascade Relay meet included swimmers from Valley Catholic, Dallas, Cascade and Sisters and its format gave each team the option of swimming mixed boys' and girls' relays in 20 events.

Only the 400-meter Medley Relay, the 200-meter Medley Relay and the 4x50-meter Free Relay had a mandatory two girls-two boys configuration.

Sisters fielded a strong combination for the second event, the 200-meter Medley Relay. Chelsea Durdan-Shaw led the Outlaws with an outstanding backstroke leg in 37.6 seconds, followed by Seth Perrine in the breaststroke in a 43.5 second race.

Converted to yard times, Perrine came within 0.04 seconds of last year's district time.

Hilary Hedemark connected with a fast butterfly leg in 33.3 seconds and Kevin Carlsmith anchored the relay with his 29.7 second freestyle for first place for the Outlaws.

Another victory for the Outlaws came in the 4x50-meter Freestyle with Hedemark, Mansker, Durdan-Shaw and Whipps.

First year swimmer Adam Guggenheim helped veterans Hilary Hedemark, Chelsea Durdan-Shaw and Jamie Cundiff to yet another first place finish. The seventh relay was a 300-meter Backstroke event in which the first and third swimmers completed 100 meters, the second and fourth competitors 50 meters each.

In spite of her ongoing recovery from shoulder surgery this summer, Hilary Hedemark came within a second of last year's district entry time and Chelsea Durdan-Shaw swam a second faster than during last year's district finals.

Jamie Cundiff improved her split from a 39.6 to 38.5 from the meet in Sweet Home two weeks ago.

Jacquelien Mansker, Dana Hughie, Anna Evered and Jessica Durham turned in solid performances in several breaststroke relays.