Our Sahuaro Swimmers went to state championships in Mesa on the 4th and 5th of November, and the girls qualified for the 6th at Skyline Aquatic Center. Diego Del Villar, Ben Canez, Andrew Kruszewski, Cedric Whetten, Brenden Kruszewski, Ava Averbach, Alyssa Hernandez, Sydney Whetten, Zoe Drane, and Rylee Holmes all qualified. Diego’s favorite part of State was the experience of being in the hotel with his teammates. “The fun wasn’t just in the pool, it was always on land.” They had many fun new experiences as a team. “State was a fun experience for ALL OF US!!!” he says. He did say that they felt pressure but were very focused on team building and not the stress of it. Diego did not swim because he was an alternate for anyone who got sick or injured on the boys’ team. However, his team had events of a free 200 relay, free 400 relay, and 400 medley relay which consists of backstroke, butterfly, breaststroke, and freestyle. The girls made the 200 medley relay, and they had one individual swimmer, Sydney, who made the 100 backstroke. They hope to have more swimmers on the team next year who are dedicated and willing to work hard on themselves and with the team to be a state swimmer or a state team.

A lot of their team-building experiences were playing board games together. For Diego, his favorite was being in the hotel room with his boys and playing Mario Kart or watching YouTube all together. They also played hide and seek in the hotel, having fun outside of the hotel walking around malls, ate pizza and ice cream together, went to Walmart, and hung around.