Starting the night with the 200 Free Relay and the addition of the 50s of stroke to the NJCAA Championship format has proven to add excitement and speed to the meet's atmosphere. Thursday night's session began with the sprint relay and was followed by the 50 Backstroke where fast times across the field sparked the crowd to cheer from the upper deck seating as the second session of finals began.
The women's relay team of Courtney Perrett, Osianna McReed, Courtney Stewart and Malin Wallen began the night with a win and were followed by their male counterparts, Cameron Newton, John Fauteux, Gavin Erdmann and Nick Loomis who also took the top spot.
Following the 200 Free Relays, the women's diving was featured. The women opened their competition on the 1-M Springboard with Indian River's Adrianna Warning, Chastity Haxton and Domineeka Luis representing the college well. Following the afternoon prelims, the team secured places one, two and five heading into the finals this evening. Warning and Luis stayed steady and strong throughout to take the top two spots respectively. Haxton made a huge push in the final six dives to overtake third place, completing the 1-2-3 sweep of the podium spots. Warning's win gave her back-to-back 1-M titles and the hope of going undefeated in her two year career if she can close out the women's 3-M board on Saturday.
Individual events saw Indian River begin the night having placed three women and four men in the top eight of the sprint backstroke event. Following the morning IRSC secured the top seeds leading to a hotly contested battle of teammates vying to secure an individual title. Meagan Abad came away with the national title on the women's side, while Jason Van Der Touw picked up his first win of the meet on the men's side. When the water had settled, the IRSC team secured places 1-2-3 in the women's event and 1-2-3-4 in the men's event.
The 400 Individual Medley was the next event on the agenda. Last night's national champion in the women's 200 Individual Medley, Natalie Grothe, used the morning swim to cruise to a fourth place seed for the final, while teammate, Madyson Lyons, secured lane four, the top spot. The night swim for Grothe was a more than twenty second drop from the morning, a swim that earned her a second individual title of the championship. Lyons had a significant time improvement as well and took home the silver. The IRSC men hoped to rebound in the individual medley events and capture the title from the favored Hylton Collinson, last night's winner of the men's 200 Individual Medley. The Iowa Lakes freshman has proven to be a worthy competitor but Andrew Wojcik, Sebastian resident, was not going to go down without a fight, earning the fastest time of the morning qualifying session. Following the first 100 yards, it was a tightly contested race. Heading into the backstroke portion, Collinson pulled away from the competition and never looked back. Wojcik took the silver with the time of 4:00.81, while Jacob Andrasco (4:12.48) picked up third place points for IRSC.
Following the grueling 400 IM, the 100 fly was up. This event featured National Record Holder, Nick Loomis. Loomis broke the record at the Spartan Invite in Clearwater this past December, setting up high expectations for this meet. The morning session proved Loomis had no nerves, dominating the field with his time of 46.53, breaking the record for a second time this year. Before the men got underway, Morgan Holt's morning swim of 56.17 was a drop of more than a full second from her season's previous best, leaving the field chasing her at this evening's finals. In the end, Osianna McReed hit the water at a blistering pace in the first 50 and held on to win the race. Holt, Ianthe Van Der Westhuizen and Kamryn Gallowich completed the sweep of the top four places. Loomis came out swinging in the men's final. His midway split of 21.60 was only .16 off the national record for the 50 Fly and he finished with a time of 47.64. Although a bit slower than the morning swim, he secured the win and his first individual title of the meet.
Up next was the 200 Freestyle, an event historically helping IRSC in the team points race. This year was no different, particularly on the men's side. The morning swims saw Indian River take the top three seeds for the women and place seven men in the final that has room for eight. In the women's race, Courtney Perrett led wire-to-wire. She was followed by Malin Wallen and Sarah Dostie who rounded out another sweep with their second and third place finishes. Cameron Newton took the early lead in the men's race at the 50, but Luka Tomic took control at the 100 mark. Tomic set a blistering pace on the back half of the race to win in a time of 1:36.28. Six teammates rounded out positions two through seven enabling the team to score 107 points in the team competition in the single event.
After a 20 minute intermission, the night ended with the 400 Medley Relays being contested. Courtney Stewart handled the backstroke leg to get things started for the women. Courtney Perrett, Morgan Holt and Osianna McReed brought it home to win the event. The men's team of Jason Van Der Touw, John Fauteux, Nick Loomis and Luka Tomic took the top spot to end day two of competition.
Women's Team Scores (Top 3)
Indian River - 574
South Georgia - 287
Iowa Central - 241.5
Men's Team Scores (Top 3)
Indian River - 669
Iowa Central - 245
Southwestern Oregon- 245
