Johnston Invitational Meet
Oskaloosa’s Owen Gordon swimming the 500 Free (photo provided)
The Oskaloosa High School Swim team traveled to Johnston on Saturday to swim against several of the largest high school swim teams in the state as Johnston, Waukee the reigning state champion, Des Moines Roosevelt, Lewis Central, Cedar Falls, Carroll were all there.
With the winter break just ending, Coach Grant believes that the Osky boys had worked hard as they had extra time in the pool to work on strength, conditioning and technique development, which all contributed to the boys having good races during the meet.
In the 200 Medley Relay Oskaloosa sent Owen Gordon, Carson Abrahamson, Jack Miller, and Colton Berg to the blocks and they came away with a 1:58.66 time. Next was the 200 Free as Jarod Miller broke his old school record time and came away swimming a 2:04.65 and Ean Beenken swam a 2:20.05 for a personal best as well for the Indians. In the 200 IM Osky sent Colin Fiechtner and he finished with a time of 2:37.09, which was a personal best. Event 4 is the 50 Free and Jack Miller swam a personal best of 24.16 for the highest place finish on the day for the Indians and Colton Berg swam a 26.95 and Owen Gordon swam a 27.03 to round out the event. Event 5 brought the 100 Fly as Jarod Miller stepped up and swam a 1:02.06 for a personal best and a top 10 finish. Event 6 is the 100 Free as Osky sent Colton Berg, Ean Beenken and Carson Abrahamson to the blocks. Colton swam a personal best of 1:02.94, Ean a 1:03.70, and Carson finished with a personal best time of 1:05.92. Next was the most grueling event of all the 500 Free as Jack Miller finished with a personal best of 5:43.60 followed by Owen Gordon with a time of 5:53.56, which was 14 seconds faster than his previous personal best. The next event of the day was the 200 Free Relay as Ean, Colin, Colton, and Jarod swam a time of 1:48.88. After the relay was the 100 Backstroke and Colin swam it for the first time in years and came away with a great time of 1:10.96. In the 10th and final event of the day Carson swam the 100 Breast in a time of 1:19.68. With all of the personal bests and how hard the group is working, hopefully the times will continue to get better as the season continues,
Next week the Indians swim at Grinnell on Tuesday at 7:00pm and at Williamsburg on Thursday. The closest meet to come and cheer on the Indians will be the following Tuesday, Jan 17th, at Ottumwa, The Beach.
