By Sofia Montoya-Deck
Hood’s swim team ended its season in the MAC championship meet on Feb. 18 with three medals and six school records.
Graduate student Hazen Stowell won gold in the 500 freestyle after breaking the school record twice in one day with a final time of 4:39.62. He also received a bronze medal in the 200 freestyle after breaking his own record with a time of 1:44.50.
Junior Isiah Brittingham also broke two team records, one in the 100 breaststroke and another in the 200 breaststroke. His final time of 2:07.93 in the 200 earned him a silver medal in the event.
Brittingham said he feels good about his performance and thanks his coaches for helping him get there. “I am looking forward to next season,” he said.
Graduate student Russell Odor swam a 56.09 in the 100-individual medley, tying the current school record. The men’s 800 free relay, which included Ben Foster, Storm Fuller, Ethan Hubble and Stowell, swam a time of 7:12.71, breaking a team record and placing them fourth overall at finals.
Overall, the men’s team placed sixth in the MAC Championships and the women’s team placed ninth.
“We had a really good year in terms of having the newcomers get accustomed to what we were doing and that showed at the end of the season,” head coach Chris Gibeau said. “[We had] a lot of best times, personal best times. The veterans kind of led the way in terms of scoring points at the conference championships meet and getting best times.”
The team began its season with practices in September and had eight meets before competing at the MAC Championships from Feb. 15 to Feb. 18.
“The way I look at meets during the season is as preparation for the championships,” Gibeau said. “You have these meets throughout the season that give our kids the opportunity to perfect their racing strategies and test out new strategies. I don’t necessarily look at wins and losses. I look at the preparation part of it as the successful part of the season.”
This year, the team celebrated four seniors at their senior day on Jan. 20: Ridley Little, Hank Machen, Odor and Stowell.
Accounting for the loss of these swimmers, Gibeau is in the midst of recruiting efforts for the team’s next season. “We’re in the heart of our recruiting season,” he said. “Getting kids on board and stuff like that should happen in the next few weeks.”
Gibeau finds that the team’s season is successful when swimmers are able to improve upon their own times and personal bests. “We make it a priority that improving your times in your events is the main goal,” he said. “If that leads to podiums and medals and team records and things like that, that’s sort of the icing on the cake. So, the focus is always on the individual getting better to help the team improve as a whole.”
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