Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Rachel - Swimming Like A Fish

8 year old Rachel has been participating on the swim team at her mom's this summer. Unfortunately all the competitions are during the day. I took a vacation day and took her to her final meet, the league championship.

There were 9 teams and a total of 508 swimmers of various ages. Rachel competed in 4 races. The 4x25 Medley Relay, 25m Backstroke, 25m Breaststroke, and 4x25 Freestyle Relay.

First up was the Medley Relay, where she swam the 3rd leg (breaststroke). She started in 3rd place and held her position, and her team finished 3rd.

Next was the Backstroke. There were 5 heats, 35 swimmers in all, in the 8 and under girls backstroke. Rachel was in the final (fastest) heat but she was in an outside lane, meaning she was around the 6th or 7th fastest time, coming into the race.

She started decent, swam hard all the way, and finished strong. It looked like she was 2nd, but when they announced the results, Rachel was the champion! Her time was 24.54!

Next came the Breaststroke. She was this time in the 2nd of 3 heats, against slower competition. She swam well again, winning her heat in a time of 32.65. She ended up faster than 2 swimmers in the final heat so she was awarded 7th place overall.

Finally she swam the 3rd leg in the freestyle relay. She started in 3rd, and swam well, almost catching the girl in first. However, the girl in 2nd also swam well, catching up to the girl in first. Rachel's team finished 3rd again.

They had a t-shirt stand and Rachel wanted a sweatshirt. I told her before her first race she had to be top 3 to get a sweatshirt. Well she certainly was, and not only did I buy her the sweatshirt, but I paid a little extra to get a sparkly puppy-dog pawprint on the sleeve.

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