By William Hernandez
The Huskies swimming and diving team placed 14th at the Pasadena Invitational swimming without a full team while posting 23 top times of the season, April 6 and 7.
The level of competition at the Invitational was tough, the 18 schools participating included the defending state champs Orange Coast College who won the women’s title in Pasadena.
On the first day of the competition the Huskies had a tough time keeping up with the other schools ending the day in 15th place.
Fortunately for the Huskies the invitational did not matter much in conference. It wasn’t a conference meet but it gave the huskies a chance to go up against excellent statewide competition.
Head Coach Erik Matheson spoke of the invitational as a chance for his squad to prepare for the South Coast Conference Championships in two weeks at Pasadena City College.
However the Huskies did muster up some quality finishes. Beisi Li and Veronica Pelayo placed 13th and 17th, repectively in the 50 breaststroke out of 64 competitiors.
Most of the Huskies success of the Invitational came in the free relay races from the ELAC A-team. In the 200 relay, they place 18th out of 36 teams. The A-team also placed in the 400 (15 of 24) and 800 free relays (10 of 15) and also the 200 medley relay (15 of 35).
After finishing the first day of competition freshman Alexandra Gonzalez mentioned that she came into Saturday’s events with “more intention to compete” and felt that the same went for her fellow teammates.
Gonzalez placed 18th out of 65 swimmers in the 50 backstroke in 33.39 seconds on Saturday. Lyz Ruvalcaba placed 19th also in the back, in 33.67, posting her fastest time of the year in this event.
A new Pasadena Invitational record was set by Shalia Yoder of Diablo Valley College in the 100 yard breaststroke coming in at 1:08.24 minutes shattering the previous record by .04 of a second. The previous record was 1:08.28.
ELAC posted a season record breaking 23 personal best individual times. Posting their fastest times of the year was Michelle Sierra, Edith Rivas and Genesis Hermosillo in the 500 free.
In the 100 individual medley it was Li in 1:12.43, Rivas (1:13.12), Krysten Aguilar (1:20.78). In the 200 IM it was Gonzalez (2:40.23) and Aguilar (2:50.10). Aguilar knocked off 12 seconds from her previous season’s best time.
Also beating their own personal best times were Suzette Merchain-Cota in the 50 butterfly (38.33) and Aguilar in the 50 breast (41.33).
In the 50 back it was Gonzalez (33.36) and Ruvalcaba (33.67) who also placed 18th and 19th out of 64 swimmers. Also in the 50 back, Felicia Ballesteros swam her personal best (41.41).
All three ELAC entries in the 1,650 free swam to personal best records in Ashley Jauregui (23:03.36), who swam 1:21.70 minutes faster, Sierra (24:48.32) and Aguilar (25:11.38).
Also swimming to this season’s fastest times were Christina Burrola in the 100 free (1:01.84), Jauregui in the 100 fly (1:17.64) and Li (1:16.57) in the 100 breast.
The diving team will be competing in the SCC Diving Championships at El Camino College tomorrow and Saturday, all day.
The swimming team will also end their regular season in SCC Swimming Championships April 19-21 at Pasadena City College.