Stallions, Coyotes open swim season
Tyler Takeda/The Madera Tribune
Madera’s Katie Ylarregui, front, and Madera South’s Vanessa Rivera begin the 200-yard individual medley relay race during Friday’s dual meet, the first meet Madera South has hosted in almost two years.
The window to begin swim season opened and the Madera South Stallions and Madera Coyotes didn’t wait too long for a County/Metro Athletic Conference battle at Madera South’s Aquatic Complex.
Both Madera boys and girls teams showed its depth in team wins over the Stallions, but it was the individual accomplishments Stallions head coach Rich Petzinger was more proud of.
“Oscar Pinto-Cabrera set a record that had been held for 10 years and broke it by 12 seconds on the first swim of the day,” he said. “He broke his own record in the 100 backstroke by two seconds. It’s a great way to get started. William Clark, a freshman, in the breaststroke, swam well. I wasn’t expecting that.”
In hosting his first meet in two years, Petzinger said it was all worth it to see his athletes competing in the pool.
“It was so great,” he said. “This was just awesome. Just to have these kids back in swimming. The smile on their faces and seeing them interact with Madera is great. It was good for them.”
Even Madera coach Erik Baymiller said just having kids in the water competing was enough for him.
“It feels so good,” he said. “It was 11 months, 13 days since we’ve had a competition. We’ve been dying to compete. Now that we’re going, we have two meets next week. The only thing is if we have problems, we can’t fix it because we only have a month of swim season.”
Highlighting the battle between the Stallions and the Coyotes began with individual races in the 200-yard individual medley.
Katie Ylarregui surged ahead of Madera South’s Vanessa Rivera in the final two legs for a 22 second victory.
However, on the boys side, Pinto-Cabrera obliterated the field with a 23 second victory in a school record time of 2:16.58.
Madera South’s Lesly Madriz outtouched Madera South’s Abigail Poore by a second to win the 50-yard freestyle.
In the boys 500-yard freestyle, it came down to the touch at the wall between Madera teammates William Magdic and Jason Pea. Magdic touched the wall at 6:57.20 while Pea hit at 6:57.26.
In a close battle in the 200-yard freestyle relay, the Madera team of Marisol Alvarez, Poore, Leah Resendez and Ylarregui outtouched the Stallions team by nine seconds for the win.
Pinto-Cabrera lowered his school record time in the 100-yard backstroke to 1:02.70 to beat Madera’s Garrin Hatfield by two seconds.
Ylarregui came away with a well-earned victory in the 100-yard breaststroke, beating Madriz by a second-and-a-half.
However, on the boys side, freshman Clark beat the field by five seconds for his first individual victory on the varsity level.
The Coyotes’ diving team begins the week Tuesday at 2:30 p.m. at Reedley, followed by the swim team at 3:30 p.m. The teams continue action Friday at Bullard-Fresno. Meanwhile, the Stallions will swim at Edison in a CMAC dual meet Friday at 3:30 p.m.
