Staff report
NEW PALESTINE — Thursday’s preliminary round of the New Palestine Boys Swimming and Diving Sectional has set the stage for Saturday’s championship and consolation finals at the New Palestine Natatorium.
Defending sectional champion New Palestine, and fellow county schools Eastern Hancock, Greenfield-Central and Mt. Vernon, along with seven other schools, all participated in the opening round of swimming. Diving preliminaries will precede swimming finals Saturday.
Two county relay teams and three county individuals set top times during the preliminaries.
In the 200-yard medley relay, where New Palestine came in as the top seed, the Dragons and Greenfield-Central tied for the fastest qualifying time at 1:41.88.
New Palestine’s Jacob Myers in the 100 butterfly (54.46 seconds), Eastern Hancock’s Gus Upchurch in the 500 freestyle (5:02.37) and Mt. Vernon’s Adison Mayes in the 100 backstroke (55.28 seconds) were at the top of timing charts after Thursday’s swims.
Richmond swimmers had the fastest swims in four races. Owen Fowler led the way in the 50 freestyle (21.58 seconds) and 100 freestyle (47.88 seconds). The Red Devils also had best times in the 200 free (1:31.42) and 400 free (3:25.77) relays.
Hagerstown had best times in three events. Aaron Turner was at the top of the list in both the 200 IM (1:59.05) and 100 breaststroke (58.83 seconds). Carter Ramsey had the quickest swim in the 200 freestyle (1:51.41).
New Palestine qualified multiple swimmers in the championship final in six of eight individual races, including three participants each in the 200 IM and 100 freestyle.
Greenfield-Central has multiple swimmers in 50 free, 100 free, and 500 free races. Eastern Hancock has two swimmers in the 500 free.
Swimmers will also score team points by their placings in the consolation finals.
Diving preliminaries begin at 9 a.m. Saturday. Swimming and diving finals will start at 1 p.m.
Swimming event winners qualify for next week’s IHSAA Boys Swimming and Diving State Finals.
In addition, any swimmer who equals or betters the state time standard in their respective event in the consolation finals or championship finals qualifies for the state meet. The state standard may not be achieved by a swimmer who is competing as the first leg of a relay.
Also, the next fastest number of swimmers in the state that would bring the total number of state meet entrants to 32 in each event will also advance.
Saturday’s top four divers will qualify for regional competition that will take place 6 p.m. Tuesday at Plainfield. The top eight at the regional will move on to the state meet.
