Donner Swim Club hosted the Donner Winter Invite last weekend at Columbus North High School.
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While the high school swimming season in nearing its postseason, the two local swim clubs’ age-group (14-and-under) teams took to the pool last weekend for the Donner Winter Invite.
Club Olympia won the boys meet and the overall combined team scoring, and finished second behind Plainfield Swim Club in girls scoring. Host Donner Swim Club finished second in the boys scoring, fourth in the girls scoring and third overall in the meet, which featured 11 teams and 387 total swimmers.
The result for Donner was a big improvement over its seventh-place finish in last year’s meet.
“That’s really good, considering we’re still in the rebuild phase,” Donner coach Mike Cunningham said. “We’re still bringing this program back and trying to get a strong program going again.”
Club Olympia had 47 swimmers competing. It had 27 first-place finishes, 202 personal records, 12 new Divisional championship cuts and three new Age Group State championship cuts.
Club Olympia competed in the Donner Winter Invite last weekend at Columbus North High School.
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Aahan Gupta had nine of the wins in 10-and-under boys events and achieved two new Age Group State cuts. Sheryan Kulkarni won four 11-12 boys events, and Joshua Pendleton won all four of his 13-and-over boys events.
Rebecca Mejia Murguia and Lexi Miller each won three 11-12 girls events. Kay Payne won two 11-12 girls events.
Chad Pendleton won two 10-and-under boys events, Arjun Agarkar won one 11-12 boys event, and Sanaa Kulkarni won one 13-and-over girls event.
Daxton Wolf swam personal-best times in all 11 of his events. Vibha Nagiligari had best times in all eight events, Vihaan Gallege swam best times in all seven events and Saanvi Dadheech had best times in all six events. Payne, Chad Pendleton and Lily Pendleton swam best times in all five of their events.
Meanwhile, Donner had 72 swimmers competing. Of its 370 total swims, the club had 264 personal-best times, 72 new Divisional cuts and one new Age Group State cut.
Cooper Bringman achieved new Divisional cuts in all seven of his swims and an Age Group State cut in the 50-yard butterfly. Ella Bringman netted new Divisional cuts in all seven of her events, and just missed an Age Group State cut in her 50 butterfly by 67-hundreths of a second.
Emily Meek qualified for Divisionals in all eight of her events and is two seconds off of a 50 freestyle Age Group State cut and three seconds off of an Age Group State cut in the 50 breaststroke and 100 breaststroke.
Donner’s Ellie Fitzsimmons swims in last weekend’s Donner Winter Invite at Columbus North High School.
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Ellie Fitzsimmons achieved six Divisional cuts and is less than two seconds off of an Age Group State cut in the 50 freestyle. Mridula Muthukumaran qualified for Divisionals in all of her events over the weekend, and is seven-tenths of a second off a Senior State cut in the 50 free and .59-seconds off in the 100 butterfly.
Donner’s Ritivik Prithviraj swims in last weekend’s Donner Winter Invite at Columbus North High School.
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Ritivik Prithiviraj qualified with new Divisional times in all seven of his events, and is only 3 three seconds off an Age Group State cut in the 50 freestyle. Aarush Mahato achieved five new Divisional cuts and is just over one second off of a Senior State cut in the 50 freestyle. Gavin Ley achieved four new divisional cuts over the weekend, and Eli McIntier qualified for Divisionals in the 50 freestyle and 100 freestyle.
Caroline Crawford and Lincoln Crawford each achieved five Divisional cuts over the weekend. Abby Proffitt qualified for with two new Divisional cuts and is just over one second off a Senior State cut in the 50 freestyle.
Kashvi Mehta achieved Divisional cuts in three of her events, and her sister Kanav Mehta achieved Divisional cuts in five of her six events. Anna Reed qualified for Divisionals in the 50 breaststroke, and her sister Courtland Reed qualified for Divisionals in the 500 Freestyle.
Emmerson Barrett qualified for Divisionals in the 50 backstroke and had best times in six of her eight swims. Levi Bense qualified for Divisionals in the 50 freestyle and 100 freestyle, with best times in five of his eight swims.
“We had a whole ton of state and individual cuts that happened across the board from all the teams, and our Donner 11-and-ups pretty much were 100 percent best times,” Cunningham said. “Our 10-and-unders were killing it in some new events they’d never swam before. It was pretty awesome. It was a great weekend.”
