Alyssa Ton, Connor Ohl repeat as champions at CIF Division 1 swim finals

WALNUT — Alyssa Ton’s solely actual competitors on the CIF Southern Section Division 1 swimming finals was herself, whereas Connor Ohl discovered himself sprinting to the end line in a race for first place.

Both the Fountain Valley High junior and Newport Harbor senior placed on spectacular performances on Saturday at Mt. San Antonio College.

Ton dominated the space freestyle occasions on the women’ facet, whereas Ohl gained the 50-yard freestyle free and completed tied for first within the 100 free on the boys’ facet. They led a handful of blistering swims from Sunset League athletes, which additionally included occasion wins for Fountain Valley senior Peter Vu and Corona del Mar juniors Ethan Lim and Sofia Szymanowski.

Ton, a University of Tennessee commit, is now a three-time CIF champion within the 200 freestyle. She gained the occasion by practically 4 seconds, touching first in 1 minute, 45.15 seconds.

She additionally repeated as 500 free champion, touching first by greater than seven seconds in one other All-American computerized time of 4:44.26.

“I think it is tough to kind of swim out there by yourself, but I think that’s where the mental side kind of comes into it too,” Ton stated. “It’s a race, and I know how to swim it, but I think sometimes I can get too comfortable … it takes guts to drop time and kind of take it to the next step. That’s where the mental side of swimming comes in.”

Ton’s profitable occasions had been sooner finally 12 months’s CIF finals, however she has been working her manner again from a knee damage suffered final August. The damage is one which Fountain Valley coach Nathan Wilcox, who additionally coaches Ton in membership swimming for Irvine Novaquatics, stated would have ended the profession of most swimmers.

“And she’s back, and back where she needs to be,” Wilcox stated. “[She’s] just got to continue to find a way to get better.”

Ohl repeated as CIF Division 1 boys’ 50 free champion, touching in 19.96 seconds, simply one-hundredth off of the meet report. It was his third time going below 20 seconds, however first time at CIF.

“It shows that if I continue to show up and I continue to work hard, then good things will happen,” stated Ohl, headed to Stanford University to play water polo. “There will be good results, and that’s one of them right there.”

He then motored down the stretch to a time of 44.32 within the 100 free, tying for first with JSerra senior Nolan Baker regardless of being in third place midway by way of the race.

“He’s been pushing me for the last two years,” Ohl stated of Baker. “It’s great that we can compete like that, everybody in that heat. I think the top five times were all within three-tenths [of a second] of each other. Really fast race, could have been anybody’s race. I’m just so fortunate for the opportunity to compete. That’s what I love, that’s what I live for right there.”

Vu, certain for Princeton University, gained the boys’ 200 IM in 1:48.60. He additionally completed fourth within the 100 breaststroke, which was gained by Lim in 54.85.

Vu stated he needed to swap it up and exit stronger within the first two strokes of the person medley, the butterfly and breaststroke, than he had prior to now.

“My plan was to take out the [butterfly] and take out the [backstroke] and hold on for dear life,” Vu stated. “That was my plan. After the backstroke, I felt surprisingly pretty good on the breaststroke, so I was like, ‘I can definitely win this.’”

Szymanowski and Lim earned a CdM sweep within the breaststroke, with Szymanowski touching first in a personal-best time of 59.51 seconds that she was more than pleased with. She was additionally third within the particular person medley.

The University of Michigan commit, who completed third within the breaststroke as a freshman and second as a sophomore, stated she had extra enjoyable this 12 months.

“I think my mind set was different — if I’m loose, I think it helps,” Szymanowski stated.

Edison senior Holden Lee completed third within the boys’ breaststroke (48.80) and second within the backstroke (49.08), additionally serving to the Chargers’ 200 and 400 freestyle relays end fifth and sixth, respectively. Both relays additionally featured Matthew Langford, Micah Baltzer and Coulter Dilts.

First-year Chargers coach Tommy Kelly stated that Lee is simply four-tenths of a second off the breaststroke faculty report. He’ll have one other probability to interrupt it on the CIF State Championships in Clovis subsequent weekend.

“Holden is so unselfish,” Kelly stated of the Pomona-Pitzer commit. “The biggest thing is his love and his care for this program.”

Huntington Beach senior Isaac Squires was sixth within the boys’ 200 free.

The CdM boys’ 200 medley relay workforce of Henry Chang, Lim, Radomir Shostak and Grant Christian positioned second, whereas CdM’s ladies’ 200 free relay workforce of Szymanowski, Grace Anderson, Kennedy Smith and Kamryn Anderson completed in seventh.

Newport Harbor’s boys had an early take-off that disqualified a second-place end within the 200 free relay, however Cooper Kelly, Dash D’Ambrosia, Kohl Tang and Ohl rebounded for a powerful third-place exhibiting within the 400 free relay.

Sailors junior Emerson Mulvey was sixth within the ladies’ 100 free. She additionally swam anchor on a 400 free relay workforce that included Harper Melstrom, Mallory Collins and Addison Ting and positioned ninth.

Top 10 workforce finishes had been earned by Edison (seventh) and Fountain Valley (tenth) on the boys’ facet.