Freshman Shepherd Rubin, 8th-grader Tucker Hicks, senior Ari Azrad, senior William Lazenby, senior Aiden Tillis, freshman Bennett Lowther, and sophomore Andrew Hilsmier pose with the State Runner-Up trophy (left to right).
On Thursday, November 21, the swim and dive team made its way up to Huntsville after school to compete in the Swim and Dive State Championship. The divers began by warming up in the dive competition pool while the swimmers were in the swim competition pool. Following the warm-up session, swimmers and divers shared a dinner at Taziki's.
The meet was divided into different sessions— half of the swimming events were held on Friday, and the other half on Saturday. Preliminaries were held in the mornings and followed by finals in the evenings. Finals consist of two heats, so up to sixteen swimmers have the chance to compete again after “prelims.” Finals are broken up into “B finals” for the swimmers who placed ninth through sixteen during prelims and “A finals,” or championship finals, for those who placed first through eighth. Swimmers’ times and points are awarded based on performance in finals. The top three finishers in any swimming event stand on a podium to receive medals during the award ceremony.
Vestavia had six divers and fifteen swimmers who qualified for the state meet! The boys’ team finished as the runner-ups, and the girls finished in eleventh place. On Friday’s finals, the boys' 200-yard medley relay (Ari Azrad, William Lazenby, Bennett Lowther, and Shepherd Rubin) finished in third place. For the boys' 200-yard freestyle, Ari Azrad and Aiden Tillis finished in first and second place respectively. In the girls' 50 freestyle, Rilie Reid finished third place. Closing out the night, Ari Azrad took first place again in the 10-yard butterfly. It was a great first day!
Freshman Bennett Lowther gets ready to dive in during a relay.
On Saturday, Rilie Reid started the team off strong with a third-place finish in the 100-yard freestyle. Lucy Comer finished in first place in the 100 adaptive freestyle, and Bennett Lowther finished second in the 100-yard freestyle. Aiden Tillis had a second-place finish in the 500-yard freestyle. And to end the night, the boys’ 400-yard freestyle relay (Ari Azrad, Bennett Lowther, William Lazenby, and Aiden Tillis) finished in first place!
Junior Rilie Reid poses with her 3rd place medals from the 50-yard and 100-yard freestyle.
Everyone who made it to the finals contributed valuable points toward the final scores! The women’s 200-yard medley relay (Emily Jin, Noa Azrad, Anna Reece Handey, and Rilie Reid) qualified for B finals, Angela Zhang qualified for B finals in the 200-yard freestyle, Lucy Comer qualified for B finals in the 50-yard freestyle, Angela Zhang and Kathryn Fulton qualified for B finals in the 500-yard freestyle, Shepherd Rubin qualified for A finals in the 500-yard freestyle, the girls’ 200-yard freestyle relay (Angela Zhang, Jasmine Zhang, Kathryn Fulton, and Emily Jin) qualified for B finals, William Lazenby qualified for A finals in the 100-yard breaststroke, and the girls’ 400-yard freestyle relay (Angela Zhang, Emily Jin, Jasmine Zhang, and Rilie Reid) qualified for A finals.
On the diving side of the meet, Clara Karr finished in ninth place and Evy Skates finished twelfth for the girls. For the boys, Pierce Bolton finished in fifteen place. They all helped contribute points to the final team scores!
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