Lisa Odland, a one-woman team, cut the competition in half at the State Championships in Saddelback last weekend.
“There were like forty teams there and our women’s team,” Tim Warnock said. “Which consists of Lisa. So team Lisa got twenty-fifth.”
The men’s team, which included Warnock, Mike Colavita and diver David Austin, placed 20th.
The best performances featured Odland, who placed sixth in the 50-yard and 100-yard breaststroke, Colavita who placed 14th in the 100-yard breaststroke and Warnock who swam his best by one second and placed 22nd in the 200-yard freestyle.
“It was an outstanding season,” swimming and diving coach Corey Stanbury, said. “We ended up beating Long Beach in the men’s competition at the state championships, which is a good thing.”
Austin finished sixth place in the three-meter board and second in the one-meter board, missing the state title by eight-tenths of a point.
Still, Stanbury was comfortable and satisfied with the team’s overall performance.
“I think we were able to beat Mt. SAC at conference but not at state,” Stanbury said. “But for us to be twentieth is pretty darn good.”
“There are a lot of teams out there that don’t get anybody to the state championships and a few teams that show up and don’t score any points because it is tough competition,” Stanbury said.
Family members and friends where not absent and arrived at the competition to support the Warriors.
There was even some out of state support that attended the meet to cheer on the team.
“My parents flew down from Oregon to watch me swim,” Warnock said. “There was also a coach from the college that I’m going to transfer to next year who saw me swim and it looks like I am going to go there.”
Warnock plans to transfer to Concordia University in Irvine, where he plans on joining both the swim and the water polo teams.
“I was hoping to do better, but I did all right,” Warnock said. “I got my best times at the conference.”
Swimmers like Michael Gavola and Daniel Bender tried to give the few teammates that did qualify for the state championships as much support as they could before and during the state competition by talking with them throughout the event.
“I called them during the day to see how they were doing,” freestyle swimmer Gavola said. “You can’t really go with them unless you drive yourself and it’s pretty far away, so nobody really went except for the swimmers.”
Bender was very close to qualifying, but fell short of making the final time by less than three seconds and was still upset with himself for losing out by such a small time margin.
“I was pretty mad that I didn’t make it because of three seconds,” Bender, 19, said.
Stanbury was aware of how stiff the competition was at the state championships.
In addition, he acknowledged the difficulty involved with just trying to qualify for the state finals.
“It is pretty elite company,” Stanbury said. “In the one hundred-yard freestyle that Tim was swimming in, two people out of our conference got to go in that event. That’s it. The third person wasn’t fast enough.”
