SILVERDALE — The Port Angeles boys swim team traveled to the Olympic Aquatic Center to compete in the annual Swimvitational meet, a highly competitive event featuring 10 teams and eight swimmers per school.
Port Angeles finished fourth overall, trailing only 3A schools Gig Harbor, Peninsula and Central Kitsap. The Roughriders were just a half point out of third place, with all eight swimmers contributing points to the team total.
The Riders opened the meet with a strong second-place finish in the 200-yard medley relay (Thomas Jones, Edward Gillespie, Miles Van Denburg and Adam Kaminski), touching just three seconds behind Gig Harbor. The race for second was tight with Olympic, as the Port Angeles team trailed the Trojans through the first three legs. Entering the final freestyle leg, Port Angeles was 1.43 seconds back before Kaminski surged ahead in the final 50 yards, overtaking Olympic by 0.18 seconds.
The Riders’ B relay of Jensen Wolfe, Jebow Nabua, Patrick Ross and Isaac Meek added valuable points with a ninth-place finish.
Van Denburg followed with a second-place finish in the 200 freestyle, shaving one second off his state-qualifying time in 1 minute, 50.88 seconds. He trailed a Kingston swimmer by roughly a second for most of the race before finding another gear in the final 25 yards to win by half a second. Jones added nine points with a sixth-place finish.
In the 200 individual medley, Ross placed fourth while Nabua tied for eighth. Wolfe was sitting in ninth after a strong swim but was disqualified on one of his turns.
Meek added points with an 11th-place finish in the 50 freestyle. In the 100 butterfly, Van Denburg placed fifth, while Ross took sixth with a personal best of 1:00.35. In the 100 freestyle, Kaminski and Gillespie pushed each other to fourth- and fifth-place finishes, respectively.
In the 200 freestyle relay, Kaminski, Gillespie, Ross and Van Denburg touched in six seconds ahead of the nearest team, but were disqualified for an early takeoff.
“We haven’t had many disqualifications this season, so having two in one meet gets everyone’s attention,” coach Sally Cole said. “It’s better to learn that lesson now and make the adjustments before it really matters in the postseason.”
In the 100 backstroke, Kaminski earned a hard-fought second-place finish, catching an Olympic swimmer in the final 25 yards by just under half a second. Co-captain Wolfe swam a personal best to place 10th with a time of 1:07.43.
Three Riders recorded personal-best times in the 100 breaststroke. Gillespie dropped nearly half a second from his previous best to finish fourth in 1:07.01, Nabua placed sixth with a similar improvement and a time of 1:09.70, and Meek capped the event with a two-second personal best of 1:12.15.
Kaminski finished as Port Angeles’ top point scorer with 24 points, followed by Van Denburg with 23 and co-captain Gillespie with 21.
“As captains this season, Edward and Jensen have done a great job leading this group,” Cole said. “They bring energy and back it up with their work, so it was great to see both of them turn that leadership into personal-best swims at this meet.”
