Swimmers keep swimming

The Lady Dogie swim team is growing closer to the state meet, and as such, head coach Doug Scribner admits that though his squad swam a bit tired after practice last week, they also swam well at the quad in Buffalo on Friday and at the Worland Invitational on Saturday.

Though there were no new qualifiers, there were improvements, some of which were significant.

“On Friday in Buffalo, Hailey [Beastrom], Kyah [Miller] and Jaydenn [Nelson] had significant improvements in the 100 Breaststroke, each taking about four seconds off their time,” Scribner acknowledged. “Raeleigh [Shipp] also took time off her 200 [Freesytle] to get back on her best time from this year.”

Shipp opted to compete in the 200 Freestyle both days because she wanted to approach it differently. According to Scribner, she decided to take it out a little easier and swim more consistently so she would have more gas in the tank at the end of the race.

“The last couple of times she’s raced it, she took it out too hard, and then struggled on the finish,” he explained. “Her practice times are there, but that race is so mental with taking it out strong and staying strong so you have what you need to finish strong.” 

On Saturday, Shipp trimmed her time down to 2:24 which is just four seconds away from qualifying in that event.

Lydia Anderson swam off events last weekend to change things up a little. One of those was the 200 Freestyle, which she finished just under a second away from hitting a qualifying time.

Beastrom also swam off events as she is looking to do the 200 IM and 500 Freestyle as many times as she can, because she is shooting for the Iron Lady Award, which Scribner gives out each year. 

“I count up how many times they do the 200 IM, 200 Free and 500 Free throughout the season and base the award off of that,” Scribner began. “Then there’s the added bonus that it builds endurance to race those grueling events.”

Beastrom also had a good time in the 50 Free with a 30-second split on her leg. She also did the 50 Backstroke leg on the 200 Medley Relay and finished in 34 seconds, which is down about a second or two from her previous times. 

“She’s getting more competitive on backstroke, and is executing her technique better in practice, so she wanted to try it this weekend,” Scribner said. “If she’s 34 on the 50 in the relay, and can hold that pace in the open, she would be under qualifying time in the 100 Backstroke by seven seconds, so she’s getting excited about that.”

On Saturday, Miller, Beastrom and Ruth Rose swam the 500 Freestyle and did very well. 

“Ruth had a gigantic improvement from last year, besting her time by a minute,” Scribner said. “It was Kyah’s first time swimming it, and her big goal for the race was to do flip turns throughout, and she was able to do that and finish with a pretty good time.”

Beastrom was right on her time for the season, however, she swam the last 25 yards with the butterfly stroke. 

“She wanted to try it and she got it done,” Scribner said, smiling. “That’s pretty impressive to do 25 yards of fly after swimming 475 yards freestyle.” 

This week, the Lady Dogies just have the Douglas Invite on Saturday where they expect to compete against five teams and will see Cheyenne East for the first time.