While the objective of the swimming programs at Columbus North is to compete for conference and sectional titles and have swimmers compete for state medals, the yearly goals with the Columbus East boys are a little more modest.
At East, the Olympians just hope to improve from the beginning of the year to the end.
This season, perhaps more than others in recent years, East has accomplished that mission. Several Olympians have made significant time drops in their events, and that has them feeling good heading into Saturday’s Hoosier Hills Conference meet at Bedford North Lawrence.
“During the season, it’s just coming in and working hard, and the longer we’re in here in the pool, the more work we put in at practice, you see it eventually in the meets,” senior Colby Hertle said. “Sometimes, it takes awhile, but eventually, we’ll start swimming better in meets, and then practice gets a little bit more fun and things just kind of come together.”
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East is coming off back-to-back dual meet wins. The Olympians beat a traditionally strong Jeffersonville squad on Saturday, then downed Greensburg on Tuesday.
“There have been ups and downs, but I try not to keep my mind on the downs,” junior Mason Curry said. “I just try to keep on getting better.”
Curry and fellow junior Chad Kelly are East’s top swimmers. Curry competes in the 200-yard individual medley and 100 butterfly, and Kelly swims the 50 freestyle and 100 freestyle.
Not far behind are sophomore breaststroke specialist Branson Young, junior diver John Roberts, senior distance swimmer Justin Borowski and Hertle, who competes in a variety of events wherever he is needed.
“(Borowski and Hertle) come to practice every day, provide leadership for the team, get the workout done and try to get everybody else to go, also,” East coach David Fribley said. “But they’re contributing, and that’s the whole thing with that middle group.”
When practice began in November, only eight swimmers showed up. Since then, the roster has grown to 19.
“We didn’t have very many guys to start,” Borowski said. “When you get to our point in swimming, for some people, it’s just kind of hard to stay motivated, and I think that’s been one of the main driving forces of this season. Everybody is so motivated, it just rubs off. It’s like a disease.”
Some of the newcomers came from other sports. Sophomore Dathan Wolf, who was on the East boys soccer team that reached the final four in Class 4A, now is one of the swim team’s best in the 100 backstroke, 200 freestyle and 50 freestyle.
“My big reason for swimming was to try to build up endurance and strength during the winter for soccer season,” Wolf said. “I kind of came in just to have fun and enjoy the team.”
Senior Ryan Smith, on the other hand, joined the team after finishing up his football career. The former offensive lineman swims the 50 freestyle and 100 freestyle
“I was told that there were more guys that wanted a better time at swimming, and they just wanted more guys to participate,” Smith said. “Since I’m a senior, and my four years of football are done, I decided to come out and give it a try. It’s been a great time just being with the guys and having to come in after school and focusing on what we need to do as a team to be prepared. It’s all just finally come down to, ‘It’s time to get to work,’ and being the best we can be as a team, even though we compete individually.”
Fribley agreed.
“This team is like a company,” Fribley said. “Everybody kind of has a role to play, and everybody contributes. We’re not loaded with career club swimmers. Most of them come in the first day of November, they swim and then they go do another sport.”
Only two of the top Olympians swim for clubs in the offseason. Borowski competes for Donner Swim Club, and Kelly swims for Club Olympia.
“If you look at North High School, we can’t necessarily compete with them because the majority of the Donner studs go to North and swim for North,” Borowski said. “That’s just a fact of life, but with what we have to work with, the people who decide to join the swim team who really enjoy this sport, are some of the best people I’ve met in a long time.”
East won three HHC titles from 1980 through 1982 and won its only sectional championship in 1982. Those droughts aren’t likely to end this year, but the Olympians are hopeful of a top-three finish Saturday at Bedford.
“We’ve had some ups and downs, some good times and also some bad ones,” Kelly said. “We’ll do good in the conference. We’ve been training hard the last couple months, and it will be a good postseason.”
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Hoosier Hills Conference boys swimmming and diving meet
When: 1 p.m. Saturday
Where: Bedford North Lawrence High School
Teams: Columbus East, Bedford North Lawrence, Floyd Central, Jeffersonville, Jennings County, Madison, New Albany, Seymour
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