In Thursday night’s Columbus North Sectional preliminaries, Christoper Lee came up just short of his season-long quest to break the Bull Frogs’ 50-yard freestyle school record.
Saturday afternoon in the sectional finals, Lee wouldn’t be denied. The North junior swam 20.61 seconds, breaking both the school and sectional record of 20.64 that was held by Sam Loescher.
“It hasn’t hit me yet,” Lee said. “Mostly, I just felt relieved. This has been weighing on me all year, and I’m just so proud of myself and the team. I wanted to get it my sophomore year, and it ended up not being that realistic, and I’m so relieved I got it this year. Breaking the record was so special to me.”
Lee also won the 100 backstroke and anchored the Bull Frogs’ 200 freestyle relay team that finished second, but went under the state cut time, to qualify for next weekend’s state finals and lead North to a second-place team finish behind Bloomington North.
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But it was that 50 freestyle that had everyone buzzing.
“I actually think he can go still a little faster,” North coach Logan Schaefer said. “We’re going to do everything we can this week to try to drop a tenth or two off of that. But he’s had that on his target for quite awhile now, and it’s great to see all his hard work go into a swim like that.”
Lee also swam a personal best in the 100 backstroke, going 51.23.
“I have a lot of things I can clean up in that,” Lee said. “I’m a little bit disappointed. But I’m still really excited.”
The Bull Frogs’ 200 freestyle relay team of freshman Daniel Utterback and juniors David Fry, Tristen Cook and Lee finished second in 1:27.73.
North also qualified a pair of divers to Tuesday’s Bloomington South Diving Regional. Junior Kyan Jiles finished second with 347.25 points, and sophomore Cole Wheeler was third with 332.40.
“I worked hard all season, and I’m just glad to see that it paid off,” Jiles said.
“I didn’t really expect it this year,” Wheeler added. “I thought that maybe I’d get fifth. I’m just so happy right now.”
Beyond that, the Bull Frogs will hope for possible call backs from four other runner-up finishes. The best of those chances is in the 200 medley relay, where Lee, Fry, Utterback and Cook clocked a 1:39.92.
Also finishing second for North were Fry in the 200 individual medley (2:04.51), Utterback in the 100 butterfly (54.59) and Aidan McAlister in the 500 freestyle (4:53.81). Cook took third in the 200 IM (2:05.77).
Bloomington North scored
448 points to win the team title. The Bull Frogs finished with 398, followed by Bloomington South with 375 and East Central with 290.
“We performed really well against a great Bloomington North team,” Schaefer said. “We’re excited about the events we have moving on. The Bull Frogs can hang their hats up knowing that they gave it their best today.”
Columbus East finished fifth with 172 points. Branson Young led the Olympians with a third-place finish in the 100 breaststroke in 1:03.50. Chad Kelly, Dathan Wolf, Young and Mason Curry were fourth in the 200 freestyle relay in 1:31.71.
East had five swims in its top 10 in school history on Saturday.
“We had 12 (personal records), and the rest of the swims were just right there,” East coach David Fribley said. “They swam well.”
Trinity Lutheran’s lone competitor to advance to Saturday, Ethan Myers, swam in the consolation heat of the 200 freestyle. Myers’ goggles came off shortly after the start, and he finished 16th in 2:16.99.
