By GARLAND KENNEDY
Sentinel Sports Editor
New swimmers dove into the sport alongside more experienced athletes over the weekend at the October Splash meet hosted by the Baranof Barracudas Swim Club at the Blatchley pool.
Some of the 87 athletes representing four Southeast teams were younger swimmers just learning the sport.
For Tommy McCarthy, 13, the weekend competition was only his second time swimming competitively.
Baranof Barracudas swimmer Taryn Fleming turns as she swims in the 100 yard butterfly, Saturday at the Blatchley Middle School pool. The team will swim again next month in Petersburg. (Sentinel photo by James Poulson)
Even so, the Sitka seventh grader took fifth in the 200-yard individual medley in 2:42. In that event, BBSC’s Zach Martens finished first in 2:23 and Corin Colliver was third to touch the wall in 2:38. In sixth place was James Nellis, with Ajay Karsunky in seventh.
For McCarthy, the medley was a novel experience.
“I swam a 200 IM. I had never swam that before. It was pretty fun… I didn’t tire myself out at the beginning and I saved energy,” he said. He joined Martens, Nellis and Eliott Galanin to swim the 200 medley relay.
In the 50 free, McCarthy shaved seconds from his previous record, placing second in 27.09 - just four hundredths of a second ahead of Martens. That race was held in a format in which athletes swam the course three times, with only the fastest advancing between rounds. Ketchikan’s Parker Hagan took first.
While McCarthy went into the October Splash with some prior experience, the meet was Tanner Ystad’s first time competing. He swam in the 50 free, 100 free, 50 backstroke and 200 freestyle relay.
In the 50, the Sitka 10-year-old took 15th in 54.47, while he and his teammates Becket Hanson, Nicholas Belding-Falzerano and Jacob Kisaka earned third place in the 200 free relay in 3:25.
Regardless of times, the new swimmer was glad to be at the meet.
“It was just fun to be there and watch everyone swim,” Ystad said.
He only began learning the sport in August, with some encouragement from family, he added.
In the future, he hopes to improve some of his non-freestyle events.
“I really want to improve on my breaststroke and my butterfly,” he said.
Lola Haley, 8, another new swimmer, competed in the 25 free, 50 free and 50 back.
The one-lap 25 free was her preferred event, “probably because it was my first one and I got pretty far.”
She finished the event in 34.49 in fourth place.
While she noted that there’s room for improvement in her swims, she said her chief goal at the meet was “to just have fun.”
She’s only been swimming since mid-summer and hopes to work on her butterfly in the coming months, she said.
Barracudas coach Kevin Knox highlighted the relay events and the special 50-yard freestyle, a series of two-lap sprints in which McCarthy finished second.
“The relays were really fun, the kids really got into them. We did a skins 50 at the very end, which is 50 freestyle – prelims, semis, finals – with a three-minute break in between each. And so it runs really fast,” the coach said.
The Barracudas compete again in November at Petersburg.
