Watauga swim
team shines

The Watauga County Swim Team qualified four swimmers to participate in the North Carolina State Championship Meet for 14 and unders last weekend.

Their efforts resulted in 17 swims, 15 best times, 14 new team records and 44.5 team points, the most by a Watauga team in more than a decade.

The four swimmers were Darby Middlebrook, swimming in the 13-14 year old girls’ division, Hagen Dietrich, swimming in the 11-12 year old boys’ division, Anne Taylor, swimming in the 11-12 girls’ division and Kimberly Vines, swimming in the 10 and Under girls’ division.

Middlebrook led the team in points with a seventh place in the 200-meter breaststroke and an 8th place in the 100-meter breaststroke scoring 23 points. Swimming in both preliminaries and finals, she swam both her events twice, resetting her own team records three times in the process.

Dietrich swam in 10 events, placing in the top 16 in six of them and scoring 20 points. Hagen won medals with his fourth-place finish in the 200-meter backstroke, sixth-place finish in the 50-meter breaststroke and eighth-place finish in the 400-meter individual medley. He also placed and scored in the 100-meter backstroke (13th), the 100-meter breaststroke (15th) and the 50-meter backstroke (16th).

Taylor swam two events in her first-ever state championship meet and shocked the competition by jumping up 30 places from her No. 45 seed in the 50-meter freestyle to tie for 15th place. Taylor also swam the 100 free and produced best times and new team records in both swims.

Vines was also swimming in her first state championship meet. Her time in the 50 meter backstroke was a 1.49 second improvement and her 33rd place finish also represented a move up from her original seed.

WST will be sending one swimmer, Konrad Kosmala, to the Senior State Championship Meet this weekend, July 26-27, in Charlotte. Kosmala will be swimming the 50 and 100 meter freestyle events.

Watauga County Swim Team is a year-round, non-profit, competitive swim team affiliated with North Carolina Swimming and USA Swimming.

For more information call head coach Richard Miller at 264-3417.