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Hawken girls sweep Orange swim relays
(by Tony Lange - January 12, 2011)
Hawken girls sweep Orange swim relays
By TONY LANGE
Eight relay teams, eight Hawken School triumphs summed up last Saturday's 35th annual Orange girls' swim relays.
Twelve schools competed, but the Lady Hawks spoiled the fun with gold in every event and won the meet with 256 points.
Orange was second with 193 points, followed by Brecksville-Broadview Heights with 166, Shaker Heights Hathaway Brown with 164, Shaker Heights with 161, Mentor with 156, Chagrin Falls with 144, Shaker Heights Laurel School with 85, Euclid with 78, Kenston with 54, Cleveland Heights Beaumont with 48 and Toledo Central Catholic with 32.
Hawken had seven girls who won three relays each: Sarah Koucheki, Marissa Cominelli, Caroline Vexler, Kaitlyn Cerne, Jordan Bitterman, Morgan Cohara and Mackenzie Harris.
Double-relay winners were: Lizzie Aronoff, Meggie Pernsteiner and Carrie Bencic.
Single-relay winners were: Maria Kolesar, Haley Schubert, Emily Heyd and Taylor Pearl.
With so many good athletes on the same team, the Hawken girls have to continue to put in yardage in practice just to compete against each other, head coach Jerry Holtrey said.
"It's very satisfying, but at the same time it gives pressure to the girls themselves that they have to keep working hard to maintain where they are in their ranking within the team itself," he said.
As a team with a dynasty reputation, the Hawken girls won every relay by three seconds or more. When that happens, the coaches and swimmers have to concentrate on individual performances and not first-place finishes when competing in relays, Holtrey said.
"When they're in their relays, they have to do a certain time," he said. "If they do their time or better than their time, then we give them a congratulations, a handshake and pat them on the back and say, 'great job. You did what we wanted you to try to do.'"
Holtrey said he doesn't do anything special in terms of conditioning for relay meets.
"What we do for the relay meets is we put the four girls who are deserving and the fastest for each particular event," he said.
The closest second-place relay was Chagrin Falls' 200 backstroke relay team of Jackie Shroyer, Meghan Shroyer, Elaine Cashy and Hannah Thombs, who finished 3.26 seconds behind Hawken with a 2:00.35.
Chagrin Falls also finished second in the 400 individual medley relay with a team of Jackie Shroyer, Meghan Shroyer, Kate Girouard and Kathryn Bullen, who finished with a 4:25.46.
The Orange girls also had two second-place relay teams. In the 200 medley relay, Kathryn Jordan, Madeline Kinkopf, Kyle Seaman and Amanda Bluso finished with a 1:59.46. And in the 400 freestyle relay, Carolyn Vekstein, Samantha King, Isabelle Schenkel and Lauren Hurd finished with a 3:49.67.
The Hawken girls' winning relays were:
200 medley relay: Cominelli, Aronoff, Koucheki, Vexler, 1:52.33.
500 freestyle crescendo relay: Fitzgerald, Bencic, Cerne, Bitterman, 4:51.77.
400 IM relay: Vexler, Persteiner, Harris, Cohara, 4:15.84.
200 freestyle relay: Harris, Bitterman, Cominelli, Koucheki, 1:42.02.
200 butterfly relay: Cerne, Vexler, Bencic, Koucheki, 1:49.50.
200 backstroke relay: Cominelli, Kolesar, Persteiner, Cohara, 1:57.09.
200 breast stroke relay: Schubert, Heyd, Pearl, Aronoff, 2:14.47.
400 freestyle relay: Bitterman, Cerne, Harris, Cohara, 3:42.98.
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