2020 Sierra Marlins Swim Team Senior Winter Championships
- December 4-6, 2020
- Folsom Aquatics Center, Folsom, CA
- Short Course Yards (25 yard)
- Results on Meet Mobile: “2020 SMST Senior Winter Championships”
- Results
California seemed determined to prevent the Sierra Marlins Swim Team from racing last weekend as the state struggled with wildfires and rising COVID-19 rates. These brought uncertainty regarding health regulations, causing the team to postpone the meet 4 times over 4 weeks. The swimmers found out last Wednesday that they would finally get to race Friday through Sunday, and that they would still be able to participate in the USA Swimming 18 & Under Winter Championships.
13-year-old Erica Jaffe was one of many swimmers who took advantage of this opportunity, posting 3 best times in total. She crushed her previous best 200 IM time from November by nearly 5 seconds, touching the wall at 2:02.72. She dropped nearly 4 seconds in her 200 back for a time of 2:00.28. Her previous best was from Sectionals in March, pre-coronavirus pandemic.
UCLA commit Rosie Murphy swept the backstroke events, starting with a 54.19 split on the lead-off leg of the 200 medley relay. This lowered her previous best from December, 2019 which was already a Summer Juniors qualifying time. The 18 & Under Winter Championships results are being updated sporadically, but as of right now this time would earn Murphy 12th place.
Murphy went on to post a 1:56.98 in the 200 back, coming within 1 second of her best time from Winter Junior Nationals in 2019. Murphy also swam the 200IM, earning a 2nd personal best at 2:01.12. Currently her 200 back swim would place her in 5th place and her 200 IM would place her in 16th place in the 18 & Under Winter Championships.
On the boy’s side, Cal commit Kai Crews bested his 100 back time from the Washington Open in January, clocking a new personal best time of 48.10. This would place him in a tie for 6th place with Josh Zuchowski of Flood Aquatics Swim Team at the 18 & Under Winter Championships.
Crews represented Indonesia at the FINA World Junior Swimming Championships in 2019, swimming all of the backstroke events, the 50 and 100 free, the 50 and 100 fly, and the 200 IM. He also made SwimSwam’s Way Too Early list of boys in the high school class of 2021.
Backstroke break-through swims were a repeating theme for the Marlins last weekend as 14-year-old Brady Calkins crushed his 3-week-old personal best in the 100 back by 1.5 seconds. He touched the wall at 52.54 with a new Sectionals qualifying time. Calkins followed up that swim with another personal best in the 200 back, touching the wall at 1:53.92, and dropping 2 seconds from another personal best that he swam in November.
Other highlights include:
- 15-year-old Ava Chavez swam 6 best times in total, dropping nearly 2 seconds from her 3-week-old 200 free personal best for a time of 1:48.70. Currently, this would place her 23rd in the 18 & Under Winter Championships.
- Cal commit Sean Swift posted a best time of 55.61 in the 100 breast, dropping .55 from his previous best that he swam at Sectionals in February. He later took down the 200 IM in a time of 1:49.87, adding less than 1 second to his best time from Sectionals in February. So far, these swims place him 18th and 22nd in the 18 & Under Winter Championships, respectively.
- Chavez clocked a personal best time in the 100 free (50.60), and dropped over 2 seconds in her 100 fly (54.60). Both of her previous best times were from December, 2019.
Erica – Great swim congratulations. Stay positive even though CA is going nuts with the close downs, You are better than any of the politicians there!
Kids just don’t seem to be affected by being out of the water for 5 months meanwhile I’m in college still struggling to swim all 4 strokes legally
Is this team in Truckee.
No, they swim out of Folsom, about an hour away from Truckee
Marlins family here. The Truckee Tahoe Swim Club recently partnered with Sierra Marlins, yes. This was in a recent email we received. Doesn’t sound like the club was acquired, but there appears to be some sort of affiliation.
They “joined” the Marlins so they could race. California regulations were only allowing Intrasquads and they kind of skirted the rules by transferring all of their swimmers to SMST and letting TTST go dormant. The temporary relationship allowed then to defy health department guidelines and slip under the radar of the current county restrictions requiring competing teams to be from adjacent counties. The funny part is that I can’t even rent an AirBnB in the Tahoe area because the locals are afraid I’ll bring covid (completely justifiable) but they let their kids subvert Covid safeguards to go to swim meets. Hypocrites.