Marine Hills paddles past Penguins

Go Twin Lakes!
Go Marine Hills!

Quite a lot of fun times going on in (and out of) the water for this annual rivalry clash of two, having-fun Seattle Summer Swim League teams in a dual meet, won this time, 433-286, by The Fish And The Tree Marine Hills team over the visiting Penguins at their pool Tuesday.

It is all about the fun for these kids totalling together, 200-plus kids, for each SSSL team. Winning is fun, but that is secondary to the...

"Ballet, I love ballet," screamed little Violet Tucker, one of the youngest ones out swimming the water at all of four years old. She swam the entire distance of 25 yards for the freestyle and backstroke races for Twin Lakes.

Ballet?

Well, trying to get this littlest of swimmers out there to talk about the swimming was not so easy, even Tucker went through the water just fine in her two races.

A teenage friend and Penguins' teammate, Kimmie Brotherton, was holding Tucker in her arms after the race and Jaycee Fraser, who won the 50 yard freestyle and 50 breaststroke, and also on the winning 100 medley relay team, came over and congratulated her and also gave Tucker a big high five, or two, or three, or...

Was this racing in swimming a lot of fun, Violet? You were a real rah-rah girl before the race, raising your arms, clapping, making fun expressions on your face, the big crowd loved you.

Tucker nodded her head up and down. But no words.

Violet, you finished the whole race, that was great.
Nod.

Brotherton then said something about ballet or was that her big sister, 9-year-old Genevieve, who said that?

Well, anyway, that was huge to get Tucker talking, and even moving from Brotherton's arms.

"Ballet, I love ballet," said Tucker to Brotherton, asking to get down.

"Watch this," said Tucker, jumping up and down on the pool deck.

Tucker jumped a few times, really going now...

This little girl was really energetic, too, before her races, rubbing her hands together and clapping and looking out at the audience who had to be liking what they saw of one of the youngest Twin Lakes member in attendance. One other Penguin is young as age four on Twin Lakes' swim team but she was not in attendance at this meet. So, Tucker was it.

Well, Tucker was fun to watch in the "Speedy Sixers" category for those age six and under as were all these kids and some really made some great accomplishments that will bode well for their future swims at Southerns where all six of the area SSSL teams -- Normandy Park, Kent, Marine Hills, Twin Lakes, Olympic View and Gregory Seahurst -- compete the end of this month. And, then a few days later, the first Tuesday of August is All City.

Best swims came from the 8 & under girls team of Breanna Ross, Taylor Kabacy, Maki Bispham, and Bridget Woods, who broke the Marine Hills pool record in the 100 yard medley, swimming a 1:19.50 time. The old record was 1:20.40.

"We normally are the same time (in previous dual meets this season as this was the final regular season swim meet), but today was different," said Bispham.

Then later on in the meet they broke the 8 & under 100 free mark of 1:10.10 with their time of 1:07.32.

"We were breaking them down," said Ross, starting to do a little break-dancing movement as she said it.

The 100 free was a record that held since 1981, a time 1:08.42 broken. And, longer held yet, the 100 medley record dated back to 1968, 1:20.40.

Individually, Ross won the 25 free in 15.70 and 25 fly in 16.11 for 8 & under. Bispham won the 25 breast (22.25) and back (20.57) in same age group.

Another record breaker was Marine Hills' Kaia Barth, who swam the 50 free in 25.18 for 15-18 year old girls, breaking the old record of Katy Jayne set back in 1998 of 25.27.

"A great way to finish up," said Barth, who is only 17 and will be breaking records next year, too, it sounds like.

Robert Hughes broke the record in the 11-12 boys 50 breast that was set by Kirk Balin back in 1971, so another longstanding team record was broken. Hughes swam a 33.37.

"We had a lot of outstanding swims," said Doug Djang, Marine Hills coach, who mentioned Tommy Cunningham and Jordan Anderson.

"I'm proud of them (the swimmers), from the parents to the swimmers, it's all about them," said Djang. "And I couldn't do it without my two other coaches helping me, Tommy and Jordan."

Great coaches helping out like Cunningham, who swam to top three finishes his senior year in freestyle events at the 4A state meet, representing Decatur High School last year.

All these coaches were great helping the kids, as were the Twin Lakes coaches, Jenna Madeja, Lauren Madeja and Kai Ory.

Djang could be seen giving high fives and encouraging his swimmers after each race as the younger and older ones all reported to their coaches afterward to see what could be improved upon.

Some stuff was not even about swimming like Kaycie Haven, afterward, getting ready to leave the pool, with a towel wrapped around her head.

"You have a towel on your head, should I call you 'Towly,'" said Djang.

Haven laughed, "They are nice, they help me get better."

For Marine Hills, more encouraging, not to mention helpful words came from Cunningham, talking to 12-year-old Madison Malnory after she raced to second place in the 50 back in 42.41, just behind teammate Jordan Frederickson's 41.79.

"See what happened," said Cunningham when Malnory reported to him after the 50 back.

"Yeah," said Malnory.

"I told you, I told you, you dropped a second because you kicked (right)," said Cunningham, smiling.

Time was better, Madison?

"Yeah, I took a whole second off," said Malnory.

Kicked right?

"He (Tommy) was asking me to slow down my kick so I can improve," said Malnory.

What's the most fun about swimming?

"You get to hang out with your friends, it's really healthy and it's really fun," said Malnory.

Then she put in a pitch for her sport and team.

"You should join Marine Hills," she said.

Why?

"Cuz it's awesome!" Malnory said.
Awesome fun.

Next up is the Southern Division meet where the top six swimmers from each team compete for the right to qualify for All-City after that.

Southerns happens on Thursday, July 29 at Olympic View and then the All City meet is right after that the following Tuesday, August 3 at Lakeridge's pool in the Renton area.