by Jack West
The George Mason Swim Team traveled to Christiansburg, Va. Sunday, Feb. 21 to compete in the 2016 Virginia High School League 2A State Championship. The boys took home a first place trophy for the third consecutive year, scoring 383 points.
The girls team won the runner up trophy to Maggie Walker Governor’s School with 315 points. Overall, 21 out of the original 22 swimmers advanced from the preliminary rounds to the final rounds of the meet.
The closest and most intense races of the night were the relays on both the girls and boys team. Kicking off the meet the boys 200 Medley Relay placed first with a time of 1:41.92 in a close finish against Maggie Walker. The girls 200 Medley Relay then placed second with a time of 1:57.57.
Then in the boys 200 Freestyle Relay, Mason swam a 1:33.91 barely putting them in second place behind Radford High School, losing by 0.82 seconds. The girls 200 Freestyle relay however pulled out a first place win with a time of 1:45.32.
The biggest event of the night however was the boys 400 Freestyle relay with freshman TJ Roche, senior Miller Surette, junior Daniel Reinfurt and junior Justin Britton. These four set not only a new team record, but also a new state record with the time of 3:18.42. The girls 400 Freestyle Relay finished in second place with a time of 4:02:07.
The night also brought about many individual highlights. Tying as top scorers and leading the team for George Mason, Britton and Surette each placed first in all their individual events – Britton in the 100 Backstroke and 100 Freestyle, Surette in the 500 Freestyle and the 200 individual medley.
Other individual highlights were freshman Adam Janicki placing fifth in the boys 200 individual medley; Roche, who placed second in the boys 100 Freestyle and third in the boys 50 Freestyle; senior Chris Markus dropped a second giving him a fourth place title in the boys 100 Fly; senior Francesca King placed fifth in the girls 100 fly; sophomore Sam Updike placed sixth in the boys 100 breaststroke; senior Julianne Kelly placed fifth in the girls 100 breaststroke dropping 1.5 seconds.
