Recovered from illness, team returns to competition
By Cort Reynolds
LIMA--The Ada High School swim team finished a solid fourth at the nine-team Lima Senior Invitational behind some winning individual finishes Saturday, December 27.
“Saturday’s meet was definitely a learning experience,” said first-year Ada swim coach Ashley Robey. “We got a late start to the meet and ended up with only 10 minutes of warm up time instead of 20. Then there were issues with the starters and technical difficulties with the operating systems.
“Given the circumstances with a lot of the swimmers still recovering from being ill, they did an amazing job and I’m super impressed with every single one of them,” she continued. “They really came to swim and gave it their all.”
Ada senior Carlie Oldfield came back from missing practice due to sickness to win the 50 and 100-yard freestyle races. She also swam the opening leg for the winning 200 free and 200 medley relay teams.
Sophomore standout Lily Baumgartner swept to victory in both the 100 butterfly and 100 backstroke events. She and Bowden also swam on the two winning relay teams alongside senior Kayla Wince.
Senior Kaitlyn Bowden touched second in the 100 butterfly and came in fifth in the 50 free.
Wince took fifth in the 100 breaststroke, with freshman teammate Alyssa Nau close behind her in seventh.
Junior Jack Baumgartner posted the top Ada boys finish by touching second in the 500 free. Senior Brayden Miller posted a fourth in the 100 backstroke, and registered two ninth-place finishes. Bulldog freshman Kaden Clum came in seventh in the 100 breaststroke.
“The girls 200 free relay was a very beautiful race to watch,” said Robey. “As was the 50 free, where Carlie clinched first place. Jack got his personal-best in the 500 free.
“Newcomers Sam (Crawford) and Kiah (Hefner) are improving every day and placed pretty well. Kayla (Wince) pushed herself in the 200. I see them all growing at every meet and that’s exactly what I’m looking for,” she added.
The Ada girls finished fourth at the meet. Bellefontaine won the girls and boys team crowns as they swept to first in all three team standings.
The Bulldog boys finished sixth out of nine teams.
In the combined team standings, Ada finished fourth with 364.5 points.
Combined Lima Invite team scores:
1. Bellefontaine 890 points
2. Jonathan Alder Plain City 587.5
3. Botkins 460
4. Ada 364.5
5. Benjamin Logan 363
6. Northridge 302
7. Urbana 275
8. Middletown 151
9. Lima Senior 9
Top Ada girls finishes:
Girls 100 Yard Butterfly Name Age School Finals Time
1 Baumgartner, Lily ADA-OH 58.39 20
2 Bowden, Kaitlyn 18 ADA-OH 1:14.43
Girls 100 Yard Backstroke Name Age School Finals Time
1 Baumgartner, Lily ADA-OH 1:00.49
Girls 50 Yard Freestyle Name Age School Finals Time
1 Oldfield, Carlie ADA-OH 26.63 20
5 Bowden, Kaitlyn 18 ADA-OH 28.46
Girls 100 Yard Freestyle Name Age School Finals Time
1 Oldfield, Carlie ADA-OH 58.73
10 Demascio, Lydia ADA-OH 1:14.63
Girls 100 Yard Breaststroke Name Age School Finals Time
5 Wince, Kayla ADA-OH 1:26.35 14
7 Nau, Alyssa ADA-OH 1:29.01
Girls 200 Yard Medley Relay Team Relay Finals Time
1 ADA-OH A 2:03.98
1) Oldfield, Carlie 2) Wince, Kayla
3) Baumgartner, Lily 4) Bowden, Kaitlyn
Girls 200 Yard Freestyle Relay Team Relay Finals Time
1 ADA-OH A 1:50.36
1) Oldfield, Carlie 2) Bowden, Kaitlyn
3) Wince, Kayla 4) Baumgartner, Lily
9 ADA-OH B 2:27.84
1) Hefner, Kiah 2) Nau, Alyssa 3) Jones, Kennedy 4) Demascio, Lydia
Lima Invite Girls team scores:
1. Bellefontaine 458 points
2. Jonathan Alder Plain City 373.5
3. Botkins 279
4. Ada 251.5
5. Northridge 190
6. Urbana 116
7. Middletown 83
8. Benjamin Logan 59
9. Lima Senior 25
Top Ada boys finishes:
Boys 500 Yard Freestyle Name Age School Finals Time
2 Baumgartner, Jack ADA-OH 6:19.86
Boys 100 Yard Backstroke Name Age School Finals Time
4 Miller, Brayden ADA-OH 1:18.11
Boys 100 Yard Breaststroke Name Age School Finals Time
7 Clum, Kaden ADA-OH 1:31.01
Boys 50 Yard Freestyle Name Age School Finals
9 Baumgartner, Jack ADA-OH 29.70
Boys 100 Yard Freestyle Name Age School Finals Time
9 Miller, Brayden ADA-OH 1:04.03 9
12 Clum, Kaden ADA-OH 1:11.44
Boys 200 Yard Freestyle Relay
8 ADA-OH A 2:15.37
1) Crawford, Sam 2) Baumgartner, Jack 3) Clum, Kaden 4) Miller, Brayden
Lima Invite boys team scores:
1. Bellefontaine 432 points
2. Benjamin Logan 304
3. Jonathan Alder Plain City 214
4. Botkins 181
5. Urbana 159
6. Ada 113
7. Northridge 112
8. Lima Senior 71
9. Middletown 68
Ada missed its scheduled meet at Van Wert last Thursday due to widespread team sickness.
“We didn’t attend the meet on Thursday at Van Wert due to a lot of swimmers being ill, as well as myself,” said Robey.
The Bulldogs are scheduled to swim next at the Bucyrus YMCA Tuesday, December 20 with five other teams.
Then they are slated to compete in the Lima Holiday Invitational at the Lima YMCA Dec. 27.
