Strong relay squads help swimmers top Asheville at home

sports@thefranklinpress.com

Relays have been a strength all year for the Franklin swim teams. The Panthers won four of the six relays Saturday, propelling the girls and boys to victories over Asheville.

Press photo/Andy Scheidler Franklin junior Cortney Medlock swims the 100-yard freestyle during Saturday's home meet. Medlock took seventh in the event.

The girls beat the Cougars 184-81, while the boys won 128-114. It was the third and final home meet of the season for FHS at the Franklin Health and Fitness Center.

All the relay teams had season-best times, expect for the boys 200 medley that had different swimmers competing.

Coach Dwain Picou anticipated that the boys 200 freestyle relay team of Travis Shook, Timothy McAllister, Eric McQuitty and Scott Oosthuysen would have a good chance to break the school record. The team came very close with a 1:37.38, finishing .49 seconds behind the record mark. It was a three-second improvement on the best time this season.

The girls 200 freestyle relay team knocked 3.5 second off its best time. Sarah Sapp, Emily Esterwood, Kara Burger and Jordan Zemmin combined to post a 1:53.29 to win the event.

The girls 200 medley and 400 freestyle relay teams improved their times by about one second, while the boys 400 freestyle relay shaved about three seconds off its best time.

"We worked on relay exchanges in practice as well as regular individual starts in Friday's practice," coach Dwain Picou said. "That was one of the factors that probably helped our relays cut off some time."

All the relay teams have regional-qualifying times, as do four individuals: Burger, McQuitty, Shook and Oosthuysen). An additional 13 swimmers have consideration times and may qualify for the regional meet in Huntersville on Feb. 8.

It was a good meet all around, as Picou estimated about 50 percent of the events had swimmers posting lifetime-best times. Most of the other swimmers were near their best times or slightly slower, he said,

Individual winners include: Sapp (200 freestyle), Burger (200 IM and 100 butterfly), Zemmin (100 freestyle), Oosthuysen (100 freestyle), Susannah McQuitty (500 freestyle), Esterwood (100 backstroke) and Shook (100 backstroke).

The regular season is finished, with conference, regional and state remaining.

The Panthers won't compete this week while taking EOC exams, but will practice in preparation for the Mountain Athletic Conference met on Saturday, Jan. 24. Franklin is hosting the event at the Waynesville Recreation Center.

"We will be working a lot more on stroke technique and sprinting during the next two weeks," Picou said. "The week before the conference meet, we will rest about half of the team to allow them to try to get some regional qualifying times. For those swimmers who have already qualified for the regional meet, we will wait to rest them the week before the regional meet."