Inconceivable!

I love the Princess Bride. Technically, I think everyone loves the Princess Bride. It is one of the best movies of all time. A classic tale of comedy, romance, action, adventure... and such great characters like Inigo Montoya, Wesley/Dread Pirate Roberts, Fezzik (Andre the Giant!), Miracle Max... How can you go wrong with that combination? It is truly one of Rob Reiner's finest creations. If you've seen it, I'm sure you agree with me that it is a modern classic. If you haven't seen it... what are you waiting for? It's 30 years old now. A must watch (97% on Rotten Tomatoes!). There are so many great classic lines... Inigo's hallmark is hard for anyone to ever forget, "Hello, My name is Inigo Montoya, you killed my father, prepare to die." Or Wesley's consistent refrain to Buttercup, "As you wish..." But Vizzini's simple, consistent exclamation sticks in the mind, both because of the quickness with which it rolls off the tongue and also because of his consistent overconfidence in his intelligence and understanding of the situation... "Inconceivable!"

If you had asked me Friday or Saturday if the team would be losing the A meet in Week 1, I would have certainly given Vizzini's succinct response, "Inconceivable!"

What if I told you that we had SEVEN swimmers post the best time for their strokes in all of Division 3 and FOUR relay teams post the top times, yet we still lost? Inconceivable!

• But true: Lincoln Jetton put up the fastest 8u Breaststroke in the Division. Alex North posted the fastest 11-12 Free and Mathew Makin had the fastest 11-12 Breast. Donovan Kovalsky is the current D3 13-14 Freestyle leader, and Jack Klopson owns the top spot for the 13-14 Breast. Natalie Crowther and Sheridan Phalen both "flew" to the fastest times in the 8u and 15-18 Fly, respectively. And the Boys 9-10, 11-12, 13-14, AND Mixed Age relays are all leading the D3 pack at this early point of the season. 

Slicing through the water like a hot knife through butter.

What if you knew that we had THREE clean sweeps on the day, yet we still lost?  Inconceivable!

• But true: 8U Girls Free, 8u Girls Back, and 9-10 Boys Fly were all clean sweeps! 

Or if I told you that we had THREE age groups win every single race that they entered, yet we still lost? Inconceivable!

• But true: A member of the MVP 8u Girls, 9-10 Boys, and 11-12 Boys won every race in every stroke, including the relays! 

I keep using that word... perhaps it does not mean what I think it means.

So, what happened?

Well, a number of things happened, to be honest:
(1) Quite a few of those great swimmers on the other team lit it up with exceptional swims, posting personal bests and leapfrogging our top seed.
(2) It was the first week of the season, so lots of swimmer's seed times of record may or may not have been very accurate (from both teams), which may have created some over-confidence.
(3) We had an unusually high number of DQ's (disqualifications), even by some of our most accomplished swimmers, in some key races.
(4) We had a few swims on our side that were off normal pace.

But, really this is normal in summer swim. So, while I joke about it being, "Inconceivable," of course it could have gone either way. If a few of those things I listed had not gone the way they did, we just as easily could have left as the victors.  If you recall my post from last week... I said we could finish the season either 5-0 or 0-5 based on how all of the swimmers do on any given Saturday. Our division has six teams that are all evenly matched. Even in a meet where we may be heavily favored, the margins are generally so slim (fractions of seconds) that a few kids going a bit faster, and a few others going a bit slower, coupled with a few DQs and the entire narrative can be flipped very easily.

The camera button was pushed while he was still on deck...
Donovan is so fast he outraces shutter speed. 

Just like the Princess Bride, or any good story, there has to be some hardship and peril before we can all live happily ever after. But rest assured, there was a lot of happily ever after in this meet, too, as I pointed out above. And I haven't even gotten to the records yet! Time to whip out that magic marker for the MVP record board, because we set two new ones. Congrats to Donovan Kovalsky whose Freestyle time of 26.42 was the fastest in MVP history for the 13-14 Boys, sneaking under Clark Bayer's previous mark of 26.47 from 2017. (Donovan... setting records... hmmmm, why does that seem familiar to me? Oh yeah, go reread just about every blog entry from 2018.) Also, congrats to the 15-18 Boys Medley Relay team of John French, T.J. Heck, Cole Miller and Clark Bayer who finished the race in a speedy 1:58.59 to best the previous mark set back in 2016 by 0.25 seconds.

And if you have been following along, you may have noticed that the 8 & under Girls were responsible for not one, but TWO clean sweeps in the Free and Back. Great work to Margaret Driscoll, Kate Barber, and Evelyn Milito for going 1-2-3 in the Free, and Elizabeth Kellogg, Kate, and Margaret for taking all the points in Back. And I also mentioned that they won every race. In addition to Margaret and Elizabeth's wins, Natalie Crowther brought home the blue ribbons in both Breast and Fly to round out the individual sweeps, while Kate, Margaret, Evelyn, and Natalie teamed up to win the Medley Relay. Great swimming, girls!

Look at that focus and technique. 

So, in summary, the 8 & under Girls won every race, had the most clean sweeps, AND brought home the most points of any MVP age group this week (34 out of a possible 45!). Do I have to tell you who wins the coveted honor of "Age Group of the Week" for Week 1? Just in case you're not good at hints... it was the 8 & under Girls.

What about that other clean sweep? Well, the 9-10 Boys Fly trio of Liam Fore, Anthony Sarro, and Evan Pribble teamed up to take all the points in that event.

I also mentioned that the 9-10 Boys and 11-12 Boys won all their races. Send out an internet version of the Triple Gator Grunt to Sam Bruce for winning Free and Back, Anthony Sarro for winning Breast, and Liam Fore for taking first in the Fly for 9-10's. Sam, Anthony, Liam and Evan teamed up for the Medley Relay win. And in the 11-12 group, Alex North won the Free, George Schulte won the Back, while Mathew Makin brought home the victories in Breast and Fly. This winning Medley was staffed by George, Alex, Matthew, and Gavin Fore. Way to dominate, boys.

Bringing home the victory in 50% of our double ROTW. 

And how about the Race of the Week? Generally, we like to identify a big drop in time to produce a stunning upset victory or something like that. We didn't really have any stunning upset victories, but we did have a couple of Gators really, "Announce their presence with authority." (That is a Nuke Laloosh line from Bull Durham. Can you really mix Bull Durham and Princess Bride in the same blog? Apparently so.)  How did they announce their presence with authority? Well, both John French and Charlie Ruppe moved up from their very successful previous season in the 13-14 year old group and are now swimming with the men in the 15-18 year old group. How did they respond to the pressure? They both dropped the hammers, made big cuts to their time trial times, and won their first events (Back and Breast) in the older group. They laugh at pressure. (They also laugh when watching the Princess Bride, but really everyone does.)

So, all-in-all, it was a pretty good meet for the Gators.

If the dance-off was scored, we totally would have won.

As an interesting end-of-blog analysis tidbit, it should be noted that there were interesting swim results from all over Division 3 this week. As I mentioned in one of last week's entries, the teams come into the season "seeded," which doesn't mean a lot for results necessarily because as I also mentioned, the teams are all pretty darn even. But it is something to analyze. Using those seedings, the 1, 2, and 3 seeds all lost. Which means the 4, 5, and 6 seeds all won. What does that mean? Who knows. It could mean one or more of the lower seeds are stronger than expected. It could also mean that other top seeds had DQ's, missing swimmers, or other problems that flipped meets. Why do I mention this? Because it means that every place in the division is still up for grabs. Losing the first meet doesn't mean no trophy any more than winning the first meet would mean no demotion. There is lots of swimming left to go. And I look forward to watching it all (and blogging about it after.).

Disclaimer: When I do these blogs, I tend to focus on some specific events or groups who perform in some remarkable fashion. That doesn't mean to exclude those swimmers who worked hard and did a great job. Every swimmer is important and every swimmer counts. To see all of the results from every swimmer this week, click here.

To see all the pictures from the meet this, and every week, click here.

Go Gators!

Butterfly pictures are the best swim pictures.