Ramona boys swim team ties two meets, Silva breaks school record

By Joe Naiman

Ramona High School swim coach Jolyn Yanez can’t recall the last dual meet with one of Ramona’s swim teams ending in a tie, but the Bulldog boys had two consecutive 85-85 ties — March 19 at home against Mission Hills and March 22 at home against San Marcos.

The meet against San Marcos also saw Ramona junior Carlo Silva make his season debut and set a school record in the 100-yard backstroke.

The two ties gave Ramona a season record of 0-3-2 entering Spring Break.

“They really brought it to another level,” Yanez said. “They really raced hard.”

Ramona’s boys lack depth — Yanez believes that the team had 10 true varsity swimmers against Mission Hills.

“I think that they did a really great job,” Yanez said. “I was excited that we came away with a tie.”

In a high school swim meet a school can enter up to three swimmers in each of the eight individual events and up to two squads in each of the relay events. In an individual event, a school receives 6 points for first place, 4 for second, 3 for third, 2 for fourth, and 1 for fifth. The first-place relay team earns 8 points for the school with 4 points being awarded for second place and 2 points for third. Since each swimmer is limited to two individual events and two relay events in a meet, at least 12 swimmers are needed for a team to maximize its point opportunities.

San Marcos earned position points at Ramona’s expense, but the Bulldogs won eight of the 11 races. The Bulldogs began the meet by winning the 200-yard medley relay. Garrett Glaudini, Cory Davison, Brandon Powell, and Isaac Gross had a time of 1:50.44, which is a consideration time for the CIF meet.

Glaudini also won the 200-yard freestyle race in 1:37.14 and the 500-yard freestyle event in 4:51.66. Both are automatic qualifying times for the CIF meet.

Powell posted an automatic qualifying time of 56.43 seconds in winning the 100-yard butterfly and a consideration time of 2:13.06 while taking first place in the 200-yard individual medley.

Davison was Ramona’s other individual race winner, completing the 50-yard freestyle in 25.00 seconds.

Ramona also won both other relay races while posting consideration times. Ian Jacoway, Spencer Schwegler, Noah LaGoe, and Gross completed the 200-yard freestyle relay in 1:44.59. Powell, Jacoway, Davison, and Glaudini won the 400-yard freestyle relay with a time of 3:33.67.

The 400-yard freestyle relay closes out a high school meet. Ramona trailed the Timberwolves by a 79-77 score following the 100-yard breaststroke, the 10th of the 11 events, so Ramona needed to win the final relay race to avoid a loss.

“It was a pretty exciting finish,” Yanez said.

Silva has other potential water aspirations; he is in the Navy’s Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps program. His first high school swim meet of 2013 was against San Marcos, and his time of 1:01.54 in the 100-yard backstroke broke the school record of 1:02.24, which was set by John Higginson in 2006.

“It was really tremendous to be able to come out first meet of the season and break John’s record,” Yanez said.

Silva also swam the 200-yard individual medley in 2:10.34, which gave him third place but earned consideration status for the CIF meet. Glaudini’s time of 2:02.06 won that race and is an automatic standard.

Glaudini also posted an automatic time of 55.10 seconds while winning the 100-yard backstroke. Powell won the 200-yard freestyle with a consideration time of 1:55.38. Davison’s time of 53.54 seconds won the 100-yard freestyle.

Ramona won both freestyle relays. The Bulldogs’ time of 1:42.27 in the 200-yard freestyle relay was posted by Davison, Gross, Schwegler, and Jacoway. The 400-yard freestyle relay which gave Ramona the tie was won by Powell, Davison, Silva, and Glaudini in 3:30.06, which is an automatic qualifying time.

“They did really great under pressure,” Yanez said.

The Bulldogs will return from Spring Break with an April 19 Valley League meet against Escondido Charter.