Emporia High senior Morgan Goad found out what it was like to swim the butterfly pain free for the first time in almost a year on Tuesday.
It turns out that it feels really good.
Goad swam a personal-best time of 1 minute, 11.16 seconds in the 100-yard butterfly to take seventh place at the season-opening Emporia High Invitational. The time was nearly 5 seconds better than her previous top time, which came as somewhat of a surprise considering the season just started.
“I had back problems last year, so it was really hard to get the motion going,” Goad said. “This race, it felt great. There were no problems at all.
“I did a lot better than I thought I would.”
Goad followed her butterfly performance with a near State-qualifying showing in the 100-yard backstroke. Her time of 1:08.83 — which placed her third — was less than 3 seconds off the mark needed to make the State meet.
“It’s pretty exciting actually,” she said. “This is the closest I’ve been to individually qualifying for State. I’ve still got a lot of hard work left though.”
Goad’s day was one of several positive outings for the EHS girls swimming and diving team, which finished the meet in fifth place out of eight teams with 283 points. Washburn Rural took the team title with 470 points.
“I thought overall we had a pretty good meet,” EHS coach Bob Yevak said. “I’m really pleased with how we did.”
Finishing ahead of Goad in the 100-yard butterfly was junior Whitney Starr, who came in fifth (1:08.34). Starr also placed 11th in the 200-yard individual medley, while teammate Caitlin McGuire followed in 12th.
The top individual performance of the day went to junior Hilary Larson, who placed second in the 50-yard freestyle in a time of 27.17 seconds, less than 1 second off the State-qualifying time.
“I had a rough time in the 50 today,” Larson said, “so we’ll see if I can get that better.”
Though she missed the qualifying for State in the 50, Larson came back to edge past the qualifying mark in the 500-yard freestyle race with a fourth-place finish in 5:43.76. After making it to State in the 500 last year, where she swam a 5:43.00, Larson’s showing on Tuesday had her coach excited.
“I’m really proud of Hilary. She had a great day,” Yevak said. “She swam right at her State times from last year in the first meet of this year. She’s a lot stronger than she was last year.”
Freshman Kathryn Scherich was right behind Larson in the 50-yard freestyle in third place (27.47 seconds), and also had a good showing in the 100-yard free, coming in fifth (1:02.34).
The EHS relay teams turned in quality performances as well, led by the State-qualifying 400-yard freestyle relay team. In the last race of the day, Emporia’s quartet of Larson, McGuire, Scherich and Starr finished in a time of 4:03.17, inching past the State-qualifying mark by a mere .79 seconds.
“The 400 relay made it barely,” Yevak said, “but they made it, and that’s all that matters right now. The times will get better.”
Emporia’s 200-yard medley relay team finished fifth (2:04.52), while the 200-yard freestyle team came in second (1:55.30), just 3 seconds behind Washburn Rural.
In the diving competition held on Monday, freshman Aubrey Armitage finished ninth out of nine divers in her first high school competition. Armitage was the only EHS diver to participate because of injuries.
The next action for EHS is March 29 at the Topeka High Invitational.