Girls swimming: Locals fare well at CIF Relays

Tony Altobelli

LONG BEACH - If Saturday’s CIF Southern Section girls swimming

relay finals are any indication of the future, expect both Newport Harbor

and Corona del Mar high schools to be right in the thick of things.

The Sailors placed seventh in the meet with 116 points, while the Sea

Kings came in eighth with 107 at Belmont Plaza.

“This was a great measuring stick for CIF,” Newport Coach Ken Lamont

said. “The season goes by so fast. We’re finally getting to full strength

and at just the right time.”

CdM Coach Doug Volding was just as pleased with his girls’

performance. “The whole team is swimming fast right now,” he said. “It’s

very exciting to see. There was a ton of tough competition and I wanted

to see if we could crack the top 10. I’m very proud of the girls for

hitting that goal.”

In addition to a top 10 showing, the Sea Kings managed to break a

two-day-old school record in the 4 x 100-yard relay. CdM broke its

previous best during Thursday’s preliminaries with a 3:44.62. That mark

was topped in Saturday’s finals when Heather Hapeman, Kim McKay, Lauren

Powers, and Vivian Liao clocked in with a 3:43.13.

With a strong opening leg in that race, Hapeman’s split time of 56.61

qualified for CIF. “That’s probably the shortest school record ever

broken,” Volding joked.

Joining Hapeman was McKay, whose 25.92 in the opening leg of the 6 x

50 free also qualified for CIF. The Sea Kings placed fourth in the event

with a 2:33.63.

Newport’s 4 x 100 individual relay squad of Nicole Mackey, Jenna

Murphy, Jennifer Arrow and Carly Geehr placed third with a solid time of

4:06.95.

In the 4 x 50 backstroke, Newport (Geehr, Murphy, Mai Tajima and

Hayley Peirsol) finished fifth with a 1:54.10, while the Sea Kings

(Christina Hewko, Jessica Harkins, Liao and McKay came in eighth

(1:59.63).

Newport’s 4 x 50 breaststroke squad of Arrow, Geehr, Mackey and Annie

Wight put together a solid third-place time of 2:10.08.

The 4 x 50 medley relay squad of Arrow, Murphy, Mackey and Tajima came

in third with a 1:53.69.

The Costa Mesa girls 4 x 100 IM finished sixth in the consolation race

with a 4:30.46.