Women swim to first NCAC win

The Oberlin women's swimming team beat the Ohio Wesleyan women for the first time since 1992, blasting them out of the water with a score of 141 to 91 on Saturday.

"The seniors had never won a meet when I took the team," said Coach Dick Michaels. Michaels is very excited by how well the women are starting to swim, especially since they won this meet against a team that Oberlin has not beat in five years.

"I'm thrilled, we wondered for a while if we were going to get better and we were actually getting worse at one point," said Michaels. "But many girls had their lifetime bests at this swim." According to Michaels it is unusual for the team to be swimming this well while practicing so hard and constantly tiring themselves out. He added that they have improved and will continue to do so.

The Oberlin women won the first race, the medley relay, by .16 seconds with a time of 4:26.60. This was followed by an array of races won with Yeowomen lifetime-bests. Julie Chor's fly split took nearly two seconds off her lifetime best leaving her with a time of 1:06.46.

First-year Erin Livensparger dropped her time in the 100-yard backstroke to 1:07.92 and the 200-yard backstroke to 2:26.18. First-year Aurie Cabou won three races. She anchored the medley and won the 50 and the 100-yard freestyle.

In the 200-yard freestyle, first-year Tiffany Hancock managed to drop her lifetime best from 2:12 to 2:10.09 and in the 500-yard freestyle from 6:04 to 5:56.28.

Junior Clara Stemwedel won the 1000-yard freestyle, the 200-yard freestyle with a season best of 2:05.46, and the 500-yard freestyle. "Clara Stemwedel probably had the most exceptional day winning three races," said Michaels.

Beth Lowe,co-captain senior, broke through her lifetime bests in both the 50 freestyle with a time of 27.93 and the 100 freestyle with a time of 1:00.52.

Junior Sarah Titus, co-captain, is in the last stages of recovering from a illness that she's had recently and came back to swim well in the 50 freestyle and the 200 backstroke.

"A lot of people really improved," said sophomore Amy Marquardt. "We have a lot of new very good swimmers and we are all pushing each other really hard." According to Marquardt all their training is starting to show through and the team will continue to push really hard.

The women swim at Wittenberg University today, and at the College of Wooster on Saturday.