The 2018 JRAC Championships were held on a rainy July 25th at swimRVA. In a strong showing with many great swims and PRs, Ridgetop finished seventh, barely edged out for the 6th-place trophy (earned by Glen Allen) by only four points. The final scores can be found here and the full results can be found here.

New Personal Best Swims

Quadruple-PR swimmers: William Kurz, Weston Williams
Triple-PR swimmers: Maddie Andrews, Aidan Cassidy, Ben Coker,  Mary Claire Friday, Davis Guise, Roger Hart, Reed Jones, Cameron Schwartz, Hayden Schwartz, Lucie Speck, Reid Winters

The best measure of success for a swimmer in a meet is to set a new personal record (PR) in an event, and many swimmers did so at this meet. This week, an amazing 13 swimmers (listed above) equaled or bettered their best times in three or more individual events.  Fifty-three swimmers set at least one personal best time. Getting a best time in a meet is something to be very proud about!

The largest single drop of the meet was recorded by Bennett Friday, who dropped 4.19 seconds from his previous best 25 back time and 1.43 seconds in his 25 free, while William Sutten dropped 3.7 sec in his 50 back and 3.4 sec in his breast – a total of 7.15 seconds. Other impressive drops were by Floyd Jones (6.0 sec combined in two events), Reid Winters (6.3 sec combined in three events), and Hayden Schwartz  (3.29 sec in 100 FR). Very nice! Current best times, sorted by name, are found here. Use them to set goals and measure your progress.

Medal Winners

Below are our medal winners. Ridgetop won a total of 27 medals! We earned 9 gold medals, 8 silver medals, and 10 bronze medals. That is truly amazing! If you would like to see how many points you earned for Ridgetop at Champs, you can find the report here.

Congratulations to our THREE double-gold medal winners! Maddie Andrews, Floyd Jones, and Lucie Speck racked in some points for the Riptides!

Gold: Maddie Andrews (2), Will Coker, Kate Farmer, Floyd Jones (2), Kyle Schwartz, Lucie Speck (2), William Sutten, Bridger Thurston, Carter Torrence,

Silver: Kate Farmer, Roger Hart, William Kurz, Alyssa Mason-Roth, Frances Melvin, Grace Phaup, Cameron Schwartz, Lucie Speck (3), Bridger Thurston, Weston Williams, Madoc Winters (2)

Bronze: Maddie Andrews, Jack Danahy, Davis Guise, Roger Hart, Tolly Hulcher, (Floyd Jones), William Kurz, Alyssa Mason-Roth, Frances Melvin, Bjorn Petersson, Grace Phaup, Ella Post (2), Christian Sleman, Molly Sleman, Bridger thurston

That’s some serious hardware! Well done, Ridgetop swimmers.

New Standards

A number of swimmers achieved new JRAC standards at the meet. Bolded names are swimmers who will remain in the same age group next year and so the team will benefit from swimming in their new speed classification.

• New Regular time standards were achieved by: Anne Budwell, Ben Coker, Madeleine Cullop, Bennett Friday, Mary Claire Friday, Roger Hart, Thomas Jebo, Floyd Jones, Reed Jones, Nash MIllner, Abigail Moore, Ella Post, Brandon Smith, Joseph Strait, Carter Torrence, and Madoc Winters.
• New X time standards were achieved by: Maddie Andrews, Will Coker, Floyd Jones, Colter Lanois, Kyle Schwartz, Lucie Speck, Bridger Thurston, Weston Williams (3)
• New XX time standards were achieved by: Kate Farmer, William Kurz (2), Cameron Schwartz

Ridgetop Top 10 and Records

Three new team records were set. Two new individual records were set by William Kurz, beating his previous record in the 50 back with a new time of 30.73, as well as taking down Hank Holland’s 50 fly record with a 29.23. The other individual record was set by Maddie Andrews in the 50 back (31.60), breaking her previous record as well. Congratulations Will and Maddie!

There were also twenty-seven swims in the all-time Ridgetop Top 10, as shown below.

• Cameron Schwartz: 50 back (3rd), 100 IM (6th),
• Molly Sleman: 50 back (6th), 50 breast (7th)
• Anne Claire Hart: 50 breast (4th),
• Kate Farmer: 50 free (2nd), 50 back (6th),
• Lucie Speck: 50 free (5th), 50 back (9th), 50 breast (tied for 4th),
• Schuyler Biltz: 50 back (10th)
• Taylor Biltz: 50 fly (8th)
• Maddie Andrews: 100 IM (6th)
• Kyle Schwartz: 25 back (7th)
• Floyd Jones: 50 fly (9th)
• William Kurz: 50 free (2nd), 50 breast (3rd)
• Will Coker: 50 free (5th), 50 back (6th)
• Weston Williams: 50 free (8th), 100 IM (8th)
• Bridger Thurston: 100 free (9th)
• Colter Lanois: 50 back (10th)
• Logan Cohn: 50 breast (10th)

Congratulations to our 2018 JRAC Champs Team!!