Local swimmers compete in region championship meet

Voice of the Student-Athlete, By Whitney Bostick

As I write this I am now finished with my high school swimming career, which has positive and negative sides to it. However some Valley swimmers have one more weekend to test their successes and others have at least one year.

My last meet was at regions in Valdez which was a brand new experience, because this was Valdez's first year hosting regions. As mine and others careers ended with some high and low points no one seemed too disappointed from the valley teams with their performance.

The Colony girls tied for second place with Valdez and Homer, while Soldotna claimed the title for first yet again. The Colony girls gave it their best try and I would like to congratulate them for their attempt.

The Colony boys also had successes in diving, Nick Wise placed first and Brandon Gonski placed second. To continue the Valley's domination of diving Palmer High's very own Hal Willardson placed third.

All the boys will be participating in the state diving competition this Friday at Chugiak and Saturday at Bartlett. Good luck boys, I wish you three the best. Sarah Brettrager, Colony, placed first in her 50 yd. freestyle and 100 yd. freestyle one last time for regions.

Also, Nancy Long, Colony, glided her way to first place in the 500 yd. freestyle. Alex Munoz, Palmer, also competed in the 500 yd. freestyle and the 200 yd. freestyle and became the new palmer stud, as we like to refer to him as. Alex made a valiant attempt in both his individual events and will be contender in those events for the next two years to come, trust me I swam in his lane for the distance practice all season he's put in a lot of work and will probably start to reap the rewards in the very near future. I know there were many more swimmers that I was not able to write about that did awesome jobs at this meet, and I congratulate each of you now. I will miss the high school and club swimming program in the valley next year; it's a great program and encourage anyone and everyone to get involved in it. It's a sport with good kids, all of whom I will miss, and a very low rate of injuries unless you're as talented as me…..

I leave you now with thanks to the Frontiersman for allowing me to share my season with you, many fond memories in my heart, and a tear on my keyboard.

Whitney Bostick is a senior at Palmer High School and a member of the Moose swim team.