Angels slashed own swim times across the board

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Incarnate Word Academy varsity boys and girls swim teams placed at the State Swim Championships at Mansfield Natatorium on Feb. 8. Out of some 60 TAPPS Division II teams who competed, the Angels did an outstanding job–slashing their own swim times across the board.

The boys' team placed ninth overall while the girls' team took 13th place. Individually, high point scorers for the boys and girls teams were freshman Jonah Lugo and sophomore Kelsi Wood. "With mainly a young team, the future of our varsity team is very bright," IWA varsity head swim coach Myra Nelson said. "Both of these swimmers are some of our future leaders on this team."  
 

Sara Beth Becker

The girls' medley relay team, which consisted of Sara Beth Becker, Peach Garcia-Esparza, Kya Wight, and Kelsi Wood, slashed over two seconds off of their regional time and placed sixth during the event. Isaiah Chimbunde, Lemuel Lopez, Sebastian Mondragon, and Kyle Wendel made up the boys medley relay team and took home ninth place, also dropping about two seconds from their time.

Kelsi followed up her relay performance with her first individual swim in the 200 free event. She dropped nearly 5 seconds from her regional time and was later back at the block for her 500 free event where she finished in eighth place. During the 500 free event, Kelsi managed to shave two seconds off from her personal best time.

After competing in a soccer game right before the team left, Lemuel was able to place seventh in the boys individual medley grabbing seventh place. Gavin Vicknair competed in the boys' sprints event and took home eighth place in both the 50 free and the 100 free events. Gavin shaved off 0.18 seconds off of his 50 free time and 0.52 off of his 100 time. Jonah had one of our best swims of the day taking home seventh place in both the 500 free and 100 fly events slashing nearly two seconds off of his regional time in the latter.
 

Peach Garcia-Esparza

Peach was the only swimmer on the girls' team to make the cut in both of her individual events. She dropped more than a full second off of her 100 fly time, tying for 12th place. Peach nabbed the seventh place spot for the 100 back event. She improved from her regional time by 2.49 seconds.

"Peach is just a sophomore and is already proving she will be a true leader on next year's team," Nelson said.

Nicholas Hein, Jonah Lugo, Kyle Wendel, and Gavin Vicknair competed in the boys 200 free relay and took off almost 3 seconds from their regional time grabbing fifth place.

Kya, who has been improving with every meet she has competed in, qualified to swim in the 100 back event and took home 11th place while also knocking over a half second off of her personal best time.

Nicholas Hein, Drake Leeson, Jonah Lugo, and Gavin Vicknair had an outstanding finish to the meet during the 400 free relay. Crushing their regional time by four seconds, the team broke the four-minute mark and took home sixth place during the competition.
 

Carolina Munoz

"The varsity team will be losing two seniors this year in Sarah Beth and Carolina, who will be missed by all on the team," Nelson said. "But with our young varsity team and the talent we have moving up from the eighth grade, I know we will do well in 2019."