Ayla awesome at CIF finals

RIVERSIDE — Newport Harbor High freshman Ayla Spitz was gaining and gaining with every stroke down the homestretch of the girls’ 100-yard freestyle on Saturday night.

Senior Katherine Wagner of Alemany High had already won the 50 freestyle earlier in the CIF Southern Section Division 1 swimming finals and was going for another win, but Spitz pushed her to the wall.

“On the last 25, I just had an extra burst of energy, so I guess I just caught up,” Spitz said. “I couldn’t see her though. I tried to keep my head down, so I didn’t know I was that close to her until after. I could see [freshman] Mackenzie [Degn of Santa Margarita] in the lane next to me, and I saw that I was keeping up with her, so I thought I must be doing OK.”

Spitz did more than OK at Riverside City College. She was out-touched by Wagner but not out-classed, finishing second by a tenth of a second in an automatic All-American time of 49.77 seconds that lowered her own school record.

She later finished fourth in the 100 backstroke in 55.39 seconds. And Spitz teamed with her twin sister Zoe, sophomore Kaela Whelan and freshman Kili Skibby to set the school record in the 200 medley relay in 1:49.12, placing 11th. The previous record was a 1:49.28 from the year 2000.

“We knew it was going to be really hard, but Coach [Brian] Melstrom told us to leave it all in the pool, and we did,” Whelan said. “We just kept working hard, knew what time we had to get and we got it.”

The Newport girls weren’t the only ones with strong performances at CIF finals. Newport senior Sawyer Farmer set the school record in the boys’ 50 freestyle and lowered his own record in the 100 free.

And the CdM boys, paced by junior Ethan Archer and some quick water polo players on the medley relay and 200 free relay, placed eighth as a team. They achieved Coach Barry O’Dea’s goal of a top 10 finish.

Farmer, bound for UC San Diego, had to feel good about his night. He was third in the 50 free in 20.80 seconds, bettering the previous Sailors mark of 20.90 set by Dan Furman in 2005. In the 100 free, Farmer finished seventh in 45.80, lowering his own school record set in Thursday’s Division 1 preliminaries.

The Harbor 400 free relay team of Reece Hemmens, Jason Grew, Nick Halphide and Farmer also placed seventh in 3:08.45, an automatic cut for next weekend’s CIF State Swimming Championships in Fresno. The quartet plan to attend to race the relay, along with Farmer in his individual events.

Of more pressing nature Saturday night was what the boys planned to order after the meet at a local In-N-Out restaurant. Coach Ross Sinclair said he wanted to take them there. Back when Sinclair swam in CIF finals for Newport Harbor at Long Beach’s Belmont Plaza, he said the Sailors swimmers went to local favorite Hof’s Hut.

There was talk that Grew would order two “4x4” burgers on Saturday night, which made Farmer smile.

“A lot,” he said when asked what he would eat. “Probably the same. Probably two 4x4s, some Animal fries and a shake.”

Archer finished fourth in the backstroke (50.33) and ninth in the butterfly (50.48) on Saturday. He also swam leadoff on a pair of impressive relays for the CdM boys.

The Sea Kings, swimming in Lane 9, finished third in the 200 medley relay. Archer, sophomore Ryan Schildwachter and seniors Jon Polos and Tanner Roletter touched in a season-best 1:34.00.

“I think we all went into it not really expecting it … [but] Barry really pumped us up before,” Roletter said. “He was like, ‘You guys think your turnovers are fast, do it faster. I know it may not seem like it from the outside lane, but you guys have a real chance to make a mark in this race.’ We were all in shock. And when we looked at our time, we were even more in shock. It’s a team with three water polo kids.”

The same was true on the 200 free relay. Archer, Polos, sophomore Davis Wong and Roletter again bettered their preliminaries showing to place fourth in 1:25.99.

“It’s great to swim with people you don’t normally swim with everyday and cheer for each other,” Archer said. “You can’t take it for granted, because I’m not going to see them in club swimming the rest of the year. It was really fun to swim with them.”

Junior Nicole Lin was the only competitor on Saturday for the CdM girls. She doesn’t really expect that to be the case next year as she said sophomore Eva Merrell, who attended the meet, will be back swimming for CdM. Merrell took this season off to focus on Olympic Trials.

As for Lin, she finished seventh in the girls’ 50 free (23.98). She also was 12th in the 100 breaststroke, in 1:05.40. She was a bit disappointed about the seventh-place finish in the 50 free after finishing fifth in the event last year.

“I actually felt pretty good, so I was surprised with my time,” Lin said. “When you feel good, you expect to have a time improvement, so when I touched and I went slower than I did last year it was a little upsetting. But I guess that gave me some motivation to push harder in the breaststroke, which was good. I made the best of that situation.”

Other swimmers also competed on consolation finals. The Newport girls’ 200 free relay team of the Spitz twins, Whelan and Skibby, which had broken the school record in the event last week at Sunset League finals, placed 11th in 1:38.24. And Zoe Spitz was 16th in the girls’ 50 free in 24.33.

CdM’s Schildwachter was 12th in the 100 breaststroke (58.36). Roletter was 16th in the boys’ 50 free in 21.78.