Outlaw swimmers face district competition next month

In their last meet before District Championships February 10-11 in Albany, a reduced group of Outlaw swimmers got a taste of the strength and depth that Cascade, North Marion, Stayton and Mollala bring to the pool.

The Cascade Cougars won 10 of 22 events; North Marion racked up winning times for six races. The rest of the teams split the remaining competitions.

Brittany Baldessari was again victorious in the 100-meter backstroke and touched the wall behind North Marion’s Jessica Garinger in the 100-meter freestyle to take second place. Baldessari also led the medley relay “A” in a personal record split of 30.4 seconds in the backstroke, followed by Allie Opsahl’s PR of 39.1 in the breaststroke, Jessie Swaner in the butterfly and Camille Pedersen in the freestyle for a third-place finish.

Their converted yard time of 2:17.6 is a season best and put the Outlaws behind Cascade and North Marion.

The Outlaws’ second group earned a respectable eighth place overall in their medley relays, with freshman Cammie Patterson swimming the butterfly leg in a stunning 37.6 seconds. Aubyn Geser’s first ever breaststroke segment showed great promise and Tori Carlson and Aria Garau completed the foursome.

The same group of girls competed again in the 200 meter freestyle relay. The “A” team of Lady Outlaws left 11 other relay teams behind and clocked a converted yard time of 2:01.5 for second place overall. The “B” team finished in seventh place with a combined time of 2:13.

On the boys’ side, freshman backstroker Drew Herron led the only medley relay with a personal best of 40.4 seconds, followed by Justin Dean’s PR in the breast. Clifton Williams swam a very good butterfly stretch and freshman Dylan Stuwe anchored. Their time of 2:34.5 put them in fifth place.

In different order the same swimmers raced the 200-meter freestyle “A” relay to a fifth place, followed by Joe Mantecon, Luke Glick, Jake Scott and Eric Brown. Everyone in the second group pulled off a personal best in their 50-meter sprints.

“The biggest improvement of the meet was undoubtedly freshman Luke Glick’s 200-meter freestyle swim,” said Coach Isolde Hedemark.

Having swum that distance only once before, Glick dropped almost 18 seconds from his previous time and decided to follow in his sister Rikki’s footsteps and make that event his specialty.

Other top 10 results included Jessie Swaner’s fourth in the breaststroke and among 19 entries, she placed fifth place in the 100-meter freestyle sprint. Swaner executed each turn with precision and improved last year’s freestyle time by almost five seconds.

Camille Pedersen added two eighth-place finishes in the 50- and 100-meter freestyle and Drew Herron (eighth) and Eric Brown (seventh) raced the 100-meter backstroke in the same heat.

“The strokes are looking very good, the turns still need quite a bit of work,” said coach Hedemark.

Allie Opsahl and Justin Dean were ninth in the breaststroke.