EHS swimming and Diving team dominates field at home quad
By Michael Ashford
Monday, January 29, 2007
Heading into the 500-yard freestyle race of Saturday’s Emporia Quad, Adam Coburn had to have been considered the heavy favorite to win the event.
His best time heading into the race was 30 seconds faster than the next fastest time. The race should have been easy, right?
Think again. No 20-lap race is ever “easy.”
“It is a tough race,” Coburn said with a smile. “It takes forever.”
Coburn made it look easy though, as he swam away from the competition in the 500-yard free by swimming a season-best time of 2 minutes, 54.78 seconds — 21 seconds than the second-place finisher. It was Coburn’s first victory in the event this season.
“It feels really good to finally win it,” he said. “Most of the time, I’m coming in fourth or fifth place.”
Coburn’s victory was part of a dominating day for the EHS swimming and diving team, as the Spartans claimed five event titles and six other second- or third-place finishes on their way to the team title with 450.5 points. El Dorado was second with 322.5 points, Winfield was third (244) and Campus was fourth (151).
“It wasn’t a real tough meet, which is really good for our kids,” coach Bob Yevak said. “This was a chance for them to win a medal and win a meet, and for the seniors, this was their last swim at home.”
This past week, the team began to taper its workouts off to prepare for the end of the season, where the goal is to be fresh and well-rested for meets like league and State.
The difference was evident only a week into the taper, as many Spartans had substantial drops in times.
“I felt pretty good,” said Dillon Suprian, who won the 100-yard backstroke in a time of 1:10.71. “I cut a second off between Thursday’s meet in Olathe and today (Saturday), and in Olathe, I cut a second off my time there. So I feel pretty good about that.”
However, the swimmer with the most impressive drop in time came from Michael Stauffer in the 200-yard IM. Though he finished seventh in the race — Tyler Michales was the top finisher for EHS in third — Stauffer cut 11 seconds off his time to finish in 2:43.23.
“That’s unbelievable in the IM,” Yevak said. “He’s starting to believe in himself. He really came on today.”
Aaron Clark came out on top in both the 50- and 100-yard freestyle races, besting his already State-qualifying times with finishes of 22.92 seconds in the 50 and 50.59 seconds in the 100.
“Aaron was unconscious today,” Yevak said. “He didn’t taper a lick this week, so who knows how fast he’s going to go.”
The other first-place showing of the day for EHS came on the diving board, as freshman Derek Krause scored a 351.55 to take the title over runner-up and teammate, Mason Mounkes. It was reported earlier in the week that Krause had qualified for the State meet at Thursday’s Olathe Quad, when he actually met the scoring mark but not the degree-of-difficulty mark, leaving him still short of the State meet.
On Saturday, diving coach Barbara Clark had Krause up the level of difficulty of his dives, and the result was an easy State-qualifying score nearly 75 points higher than needed.
All three of Emporia’s relays teams — the 200-yard medley, the 200-yard freestyle and the 400-yard freestyle — took second place, while EHS got a second-place finish by Cody Yevak in the 100-yard butterfly and third-place outing from Coburn in the 200-yard free. Miles Ringgold took fourth in the 100-yard breaststroke.