swimmers

The defending state champion in the 50-yard freestyle likes her chances in Saturday's final. Glenbrook South senior Kelly Hagerty, coming off disappointing sectional performance, was right back near the top after the state preliminaries Friday at New Trier. Hagerty swam a 23.90 to finish with the third best time in the preliminaries behind Anna-Jonesboro senior Elizabeth Bell (23.84) and Loyola freshman Evan Swenson (23.88).  

The Buffalo girls swimming and diving team had its best performance ever at the Section 8AA Championships last week and is now sending an individual and two relay teams to the state meet. Buffalo took second place to Maple Grove during the section meet at St. Cloud Tech on Friday and Saturday. While doing so, the team qualified its 200 freestyle relay and its 400 freestyle relay teams for state.  

Newburgh Free Academy freshman Brittany Friese is the number two seed in finals — and the top public school competitor — in the 200-yard freestyle and 500 freestyle after the first day of the state girls' swimming championships at Webster-Schroeder High School. The finals will be held Saturday morning. The top ten prelim finishers will compete in the 'A' final and the next ten in the 'B' final.  

The final leg of the shortcourse swimming World Cup gets under way in Singapore on Saturday with expectations high that world records will fall. Sixteen new marks were set in Berlin last weekend with the vast majority achieved by athletes wearing the high-tech swimsuits that will be banned from January 1. It means Singapore will be one of the last times the controversial suits will be worn and swimmers will want to set more records with the impact of the new regulations on global swimming times yet to  

Four Austin swimmers advanced to Saturday's round at the Class 'A' state swimming and diving meet at the University of Minnesota Aquatic Center in Minneapolis Friday. Austin junior Averi Splinter reached the 100-yard butterfly finals and the 200-yard medley relay team of Brooke Johnson, Kelli Bednar, Averi Splinter and Helen Heimark advanced to the consolation round. Johnson, a junior, also reached the consolation round in the 100-yard backstroke, when she finished 13th with a time of 1:03.15. Taylor  

Two City of Bradford members helped Yorkshire to second place in the National Masters Inter-County Meet last weekend in Blackpool. Chris Brown and Stuart Broadbent each competed in two individual and two team races to secure the county a runners-up spot to Cheshire in the Wilmott Dixon Trophy. Brown swam in the 55-year plus category, and posted times of 31.79sec in the 50m backstroke and 30.47 in the 50m butterfly.  

The Trident Swim team of Ladysmith/Flambeau/Bruce returned from the WIAA State Championship Swim Meet with a 14th place finish overall in the 200 Freestyle Relay. The relay team of seniors Missy Avery, Rachel Helgeson, Cassie Long and Flambeau junior Hailey Zimmer went head to head with some very fast teams in their last swim of the season. Wrapping up their 2009 season, these four ladies have had quite a ride.  

Livonia sophomore Kaitlin Sessler this afternoon became Section V's sixth qualifier at the New York State Federation Swimming and Diving Championships. Four events remained. Sessler placed 10th in the 100-yard freestyle with a swim of 54.13 seconds at the Webster Aquatic Center, strong enough to advance into the finals on Saturday.  

The Lady Cardinals totaled 381 points. Parkview (295 points) finished second and Academy of the Sacred Heart (291) finished third. St. James finished seventh, with 79 points.