Sports : Viking swimmers take on big schools at C.R. Washington

Nine schools, fourteen teams and nearly 200 swimmers. Tuesday night at Cedar Rapids Washington the Vinton-Shellsburg swimmers had the opportunity to swim with the big schools and came up big. The Vikes, facing a field comprised of all Mississippi Valley Conference (MVC) Schools, managed a very respectable ninth place defeating teams that included CR Jefferson and Dubuque Hempstead. The Patrick Karamitros Invitational, named for a Washington swimmer who passed away in 2010, brings in MVC schools lower-level varsity and JV swimmers. The meet was originally designed as JV meet though a number of schools now use this as a final competition for their varsity swimmers battling for a roster spot at districts.

Senior captain Anthony Dickerson turned in a career best performance and earned his way onto the awards podium with a fourth place finish in the 50 freestyle. The Viking 200 Free Relay of Dickerson, Matt Upmeyer, Jordan Evans and Caleb Kruckenburg also made the podium with a 6th place finish out of 25 teams. The 200 Medley Relay team of Upmeyer, Ryan Levis, Dickerson and Evans just missed making the top 6 finishing 7th versus a field of 20 relay teams.

Despite not tapering for this meet, as did much of the competition for which this was their final meet of the year, the Vikings turned in another meet full of new personal best times. Out of the 42 individual swims the Vikes registered 28 new bests led by four each from Caleb Kruckenburg, Alex Dick and Ben Eden. Dylan Geater, Lewis Williams and Kyle Schemmel each set three new personal records.

Vinton-Shellsburg will be at home Thursday at 4:15 at the Iowa Braille School pool taking on Decorah in a make-up of a meet twice previously postponed due to weather. Saturday they travel to Decorah for an invitational meet with Decorah, Newton, Grinnell, Boone and Oskaloosa.

Click to View Swim Results