Gross qualifies in his first meet of the season

Sonja Karp
NLJ Sports Editor
  
Ramsey Gross missed out on preseason swim meets after the first weekend was canceled due to inclement weather and having scheduling conflicts with the second weekend. However, the sophomore made up for lost time last weekend in Douglas by qualifying for the state meet in both the 200 IM and the 100 Backstroke, and doing so with personal best times.
“Ramsey surprised himself in the 200 IM, but he looked great and he is pretty strong in all four strokes,” head coach Doug Scribner said. “He was also surprised in the backstroke, but that is one of his strongest strokes. He had a strong finish at state last year, but I don’t think he was expecting to do that well in his first competition of the year.”
Gross beat all his competition to the wall to take first place in the 200 IM with a time of 2:45.89, which was 4.4 seconds faster than his previous personal best. He was second in the backstroke with a time of 1:15.36, which is also a PR by 2.03 seconds. 
The Dogies swam against Douglas and Rawlins in the triangular meet on Thursday, and according to Scribner his squad competed well against both teams. 
“I thought they scored the meet, but I know that just by the way we placed against each team — which was pretty good — we did pretty well,” he began. “We won a couple of events and placed multiple people in a couple of other events, so we swam well against them.”
“I think I remember the score against Douglas being 40-60 which is pretty good considering they outsize us by a lot,” Scribner continued. “With all the circumstances, I thought we did pretty well especially since it was only our third meet of the season, and the first two were snowed out.”
The Dogies had just one meet before Christmas and then were off for three weeks. However, Scribner was pleased to see a great turnout for practice over the break, which he claimed was one of the best he had ever had regarding participation.
The Dogies put up six PRs on the day from Gross, Nate Strickland, Sam Scribner and Zade Orsborn.
Scribner swam the 200 Free and put up a PR of 1:46.13. The time is just over 7 seconds faster than the time he put up in Cheyenne earlier this year. He also improved 3.1 seconds for a personal best in the 100 Breaststroke. 
“Sam had a great swim in the breaststroke, and it is one of his stronger events,” Scribner nodded. “He stayed right with Zade for the first 75 meters, but his last turn wasn’t great and so that is where he fell a little bit behind.”
Strickland, also competing for the first time this season, improved .32 of a second in the 50 Free, while Orsborn took off .63 of a second from his best time in the 100 Breaststroke.
“Zade’s race in the breaststroke was a good one,” Scribner said. “When he looked at his time, he was a little disappointed because he was still short of qualifying, but it was his best time yet, so it will come.”
Orsborn was just about 3 seconds off the mark for the 3A qualifying time for the 100 Breaststroke. The senior qualified in the Butterfly and the 200 Free in his first meet of the season, but is looking to add more to his state slate.  
The Dogies book-ended the day by taking third in the 200 Medley Relay to start the meet, and finishing it off by taking third in the 400 Free Relay. They didn’t swim the 200 Free Relay due to a combination of not having enough swimmers and having the whole team entered in the Backstroke and Breaststroke which follow that event.
This week the team will go to Buffalo on Friday and back to Douglas for an invitational on Saturday. There is a chance they will also attend a meet in Douglas on Thursday, however Scribner was not certain about that as of press time.