Warrior girls savor competitive swim meet

The first two Fallbrook High School swim meets of the 2020 season resulted in the girls’ team winning by 113-17 and 115-50 scores. The Warriors’ March 10 home meet against Rancho Buena Vista High School provided more competition for Fallbrook, whose dual meet record improved to 3-0 with a 97-68 victory.

“It was nice to have a close meet,” Fallbrook coach Sean Redmond said. “It was great racing for them.”

Each school is allowed three swimmers in each of the eight individual races which provide six team points for first place, four points for second, three points for third, two points for fourth and one point for fifth. A school can enter two quartets in each of the three relay races which award eight points for first, four for second and two for third.

“We were fairly close-up until the 50 free,” Redmond said.

The 50-yard freestyle is actually the fourth of the 11 races, but the Longhorns took first-place points in two of the first three events with the exception being senior Sophia Wallace winning the 200-yard freestyle with a CIF meet consideration time of 2 minutes, 12.44 seconds.

Fallbrook sophomore Jocelyn Jones won the 50-yard freestyle race with a time of 25.60 seconds, which is a CIF meet automatic qualifying time. RBV senior Emma Hart then won the 100-yard butterfly to complement her first-place finish in the 200-yard individual medley, but Jones won the 100-yard freestyle in a consideration time of 57.12 seconds and Rose Khattar gave Fallbrook second-place points with a 1:01.71 performance.

“The second half our depth was starting to show through,” Redmond said.

The 100-yard freestyle is followed by the 500-yard freestyle, and Fallbrook also took first and second in that event, March 10, with freshman Stephanie Hanlon finishing first at 6:22.74 and junior Emma Goode taking second at 7:01.81.

A consideration time of 1:58.00 gave Fallbrook first place in the 200-yard freestyle relay. Wallace, sophomore Spanish exchange student Aina Piza-Serra, freshman Samantha Hanlon and Jones comprised Fallbrook’s winning quartet.

The Warriors added first-place and second-place points for the 100-yard backstroke with senior Anna Draves winning in 1:12.01 and Samantha Hanlon touching the final wall 1:16.76 after the race began.

Rancho Bella Vista senior Taylor Basso then won the 100-yard breaststroke. The Longhorns had the winning time of 4:12.16 in the 400-yard freestyle relay race which concluded the meet, but Fallbrook posted a consideration time of 4:12.85.

“It was a close race,” Redmond said.

Fallbrook’s quartet consisted of Draves, Khattar, sophomore Brooke Van Norstran and Wallace.

If only one school in a dual meet has a diver the diving is not included in the team score, but the divers are scored for CIF qualifying purposes. Fallbrook freshman Payton Wilson had a score of 199.35 points for her six dives, junior Kassie Ewig accumulated 181.60 points and Samantha Hanlon had 146.20 points.

Joe Naiman can be reached by email at [email protected].