The girls’ swim team is having a very impressive season. They defeated Shakopee, Eastview, Lakeville South, and Moorhead by considerable margins, placed second at the UND Invite, and emerged victorious at the Spartan Invite.

In addition to these team victories, the girls are achieving individual accomplishments as well. According to senior Alissa Ellingson, many of the swimmers have already beaten their personal best times.

“Our team has a lot of strengths,” stated senior captain Haley Pesik, “We have a lot of depth, which means we have numerous fast swimmers in each event. We are also very supportive of each other.”

“The highlight of this season so far was probably our annual team trip to Moorhead and UND this last weekend. It is always a lot of fun. This year, it was especially tiring, though, because we had a meet on Thursday before we left and then more meets on Friday and Saturday as well,” Pesik added.

Despite having three meets in one week, the girls still performed well. “[We] push ourselves every day at practice, even before meets, so that we know how to race when we are tired,” said Ellingson of how they pulled it off.

To keep their competitive edge, Ellingson declared that the girls are trying to shave off time during their turns. “We practice underwater kicking, ‘exploding’ into our turns, and racing each other in and out of turns.”

Besides her short term goal of winning as many meets as possible, Pesik remarked that she hoped the team would send a few girls to the state competition in November. To do so, she claims they must “keep working hard in and out of the pool and pushing ourselves as hard as we can.”

The team is optimistic about the upcoming home meet against Apple Valley. “We have been working hard this week, including lifting on Tuesday. We perform excellently under pressure and I expect that we will have a great meet on Thursday at Dakota Hills,” Ellingson shared.