Tsunamis Kick Off 2009 with Best Times!

Tsunamis Kick Off 2009 Season With a Bang!!

If the rest of 2009 turns out to be as good as the GPAC Meet was for our Tsunamis, then it's going to be one heck of a great year!  PCST brought only a handful of swimmers to the meet but boy were those swimmers great.  :) 

Overall Team Rankings: In a meet that had an amazing 650 swimmers from only 14 teams, easy math will tell you that 22 swimmers wouldn't be enough to be one of the top teams at the meet.  However, in spite of our smaller group, we still managed to get 10th place overall out of those 14 teams, so well done Tsunamis!

Below are some of the great achievements from our Tsunami swimmers from the GPAC Meet!

First Ever Swim Meet for Javier Elias Banda!  Congratulations to Javier for swimming some spectacular times in his first ever official PCST meet.  He went home with multiple heat winner ribbons and loads great swims!

One Half of the Team Scores Points!  This was a very competitive meet where scoring in the Top 8 in an individual event was no easy feat.  Congratulations to Michaela Ashley, Dylan Gandy, Tristan Gandy, Nicole Gazia, Nico Gobel, Reis Gordon, Staci Lehman, Dylan Mock, Kyle Olstad, Amelia Talkington and Michael Whitehead for scoring very valuable points for the Tsunamis.

New Tsunami Awards Achieved!  The Tsunami Awards can be found on the website as well as on the bulletin boards at practice.  They start over January 1st each year, so this list consists of accomplishments made in 2009 so far (which is only the GPAC Meet).  It lists the "B", "BB", "A", "AA", etc. times as well as Southeastern, Sectional, Junior National qualifiers, etc.  Final results for the 2008 Tsunami Awards can also be found on this website.

"B" Swimmers Javier Elias Banda (25 Fr, 50 Fr, 25 Ba, 50 Ba), Tristan Gandy 2(5 Fr, 50 Fr, 50 Ba, 25 Br), Nico Gobel (25 Fr, 50 Fr, 25 Ba, 25 Fl, 50 Fl), Nathan Hedglin (50 Ba), Heidi Retherford (25 Fr, 50 Fr, 25 Ba, 50 Ba, 50 Br, 25 Fl)

"BB" Swimmers JD Clutch (100 Ba), Dylan Gandy (50 Fr, 100 Fr, 500 Fr, 50 Ba, 100 Ba, 50 Br, 100 Br, 100 IM, 200 IM), Staci Lehman (100 Fr, 100 Ba, 100 Br, 400 IM), Dylan Mock (50 Fr, 100 Fr, 200 Fr, 500 Fr, 200 Ba, 200 IM, 400 IM), Hannah Retherford (50 Ba, 100 Ba), Phoenix Rine (100 Br, 200 Br), Michael Whitehead (100 Fr, 200 Fr, 500 Fr, 100 Ba, 200 Ba)

"A" Swimmers Michaela Ashley (100 Br), Reis Gordon (100 Fl), Kyle Olstad (100 Br, 200 Fr), Emily Silver (50 Ba), Amelia Talkington (50 Fr, 100 Fr, 25 Ba, 50 Ba, 25 Br, 50 Br, 25 Fl)

"AA" Swimmers Nicole Gazia (50 Fr, 100 Fr, 200 Fr, 500 Fr, 100 Br)

All-Time Top Ten Improvements: There were 3 swimmers who made improvements to some of the All-Time Top Ten List that includes the best swimmers in each event regardless of age.  This is becoming a very prestigious list, so a great big congratulations is in order to the following swimmers!

Michael Whitehead 100 IM 9th (1:09.64)

Nicole Gazia 100 IM 2nd (1:07.56)

Kyle Olstad 100 IM 7th (1:08.45)

All-Time Age Group Top Ten Ranking Improvements: We had 11 swimmers improve some of the all-time age group rankings in PCST history!  This means that 1/2 of the swimmers who competed in the meet are literally some of the best PCST swimmers in team history.  Amazing job guys!  Here they are:

Amelia Talkington (8 & U Girls): 50 Free 3rd (36.75), 25 Breast 3rd (21.69), 50 Breast 4th (48.83), 25 Fly 3rd (18.94), 100 Free 4th (1:22.66)

Emily Silver (8 & U Girls): 50 Back 5th (46.72)

Heidi Retherford (8 & U Girls): 50 Breast 8th (59.87), 100 Free 10th (1:45.18)

Nico Gobel (8 & U Boys): 25 Fly 10th (22.94), 50 Fly 10th (56.86)

Michaela Ashley (10 & U Girls): 50 Breast 8th (42.49), 100 Breast 7th (1:29.38)

Reis Gordon (10 & U Boys): 100 Free 9th (1:14.58), 500 Free 6th (7:26.05), 50 Fly (6th 38.49), 100 IM 10th (1:25.65), 200 IM 4th (3:02.06)

Dylan Gandy (10 & U Boys): 500 Free 5th (7:21.17), 50 Back 10th (40.62)

Nicole Gazia (13-14 Girls): 200 Free 9th (2:07.78), 500 Free 6th (5:38.21), 200 IM 6th (2:26.40), 400 IM 6th (5:04.85)

Dylan Mock (13-14 Boys): 500 Free 10th (5:41.87), 200 Fly 7th (2:33.34), 400 IM 8th (5:08.37)

Kyle Ostad (15-16 Girls): 200 Free 9th (2:07.18), 500 Free 10th (5:48.19), 200 Breast 3rd (2:39.62)

Staci Lehman (Senior Girls): 100 Back 8th (1:10.62)

New Southeastern Championship Qualifier!  We are incredibly proud of Dylan Mock for qualifying for the Southeastern Championships in his first ever 13-14 Boys swim meet!  There's nothing like qualifying for the big dance the first time you ever do a 200 Fly!   Dylan also swam the 200 Back, 200 Breast, and 400 IM all for the first time at the GPAC meet and swam amazingly!  :)  This brings our total of Southeastern Qualifiers up to 24 for the late Feb. championship meet in Nashville, TN!

Needless to say, the GPAC meet was a great success.  I cannot wait to see just how much I'm going to have to type out for our ECS (Ft. Walton) and ATAC (Tallahassee) meets coming up next weekend!  It's going to be great with some record breaking performances for sure!

CATCH THE WAVE!

Coach Jonathan