Better than We Could Have Asked For

Day One is in the books and what a night it was. Five events - five wins. Some random observations on the night:

• 200 Free Relay - Bryce leads with a 20.94! Blake with a safe-start 21.15, Rip rips a 20.94 and Bax anchors in 20.48 - over a two second win over Wheaton. That erased our school record by nearly a second and was under last year's qualifying time - unfortunately, its already ranked 9th in the country and we'll have to go faster to get a 1:23.54 in. Our B, C and D squads were also moving - get this they rank 1st, 10th (1:27.93), and 17th (1:30.71) all-time school history. Some splits I can remember offhand - Mitchell 21.77, Bob P 21.90, Kaseska 22.36 lead-off, VanHuis 22.36, Isaac 22.46
• 500 Free - Paul Busse muscles his way to a win in the 500. It wasn't pretty, but he got the job done in an NCAA 'B' cut of 4:38.50 - 3rd best all-time. Derek Schneider dropped a spot from the morning, going 4:44.44 while Bryan Pelka dropped time to go a 4:46.48, giving us hope he's getting in shape. Ben Healy wins the consol heat with a 4:54.84.
• 200 IM - Stephen Schranck nabs his first individual title since his freshman year. Though untapered he still soldiered to a 1:55.36 to win by a second. Scott Kaseska looked great in the morning, like garbage at night, but the results are the same, thus proving its not how you feel. In Consols Tom Stowe and Pat Alfes go 1-2 with Tommy getting Pat by 0.01 - not bad considering Pat stormed home with a 28.0 split. (third-fastest of the meet).
• 50 Free - Wow - four guys under 22 including one under 21. Bryce wins with a 20.89 for a new meet and school record. Bax get's a B cut with a 21.18 - second fastest all-time. Blake and Rip both dip under 22 with a 21.77 and 21.91 respectively. In consols Varner moved up four spots with a 22.46.
• 400 Medley Relay - Again it wasn't pretty, but it was a 'W'. Varner 54.4, Stephen 57.8, Bryce 49.8, Rip 46.6 - just off the 'B' cut. Breast should be a good race with Wheaton's Nitz and IWU's Rock both going 57's. Other splits off the top of my sleepy head: Scott finally under 1:00 in the breast (59.99), Blake 47.94, Buck 49.3 free, Pat lifetime best 56.6, Chris Steenrod and Alex flying on breaststrokes 1:04.13 and 1:01.23, Mitchell 53.01 fly.

End of the day - Carthage 277, Wheaton 206, Rose-Hulman 150, IWU 123, Millikin 86, Augie 53, North Central 40.

Big day tomorrow - lots of points at stake. Time for bed.