The Falcons women’s swim team defeated Chaffey College with a score of 178-65 and lost to Long Beach City College with a score of 152-106 at the South Coast conference opener held at Cerritos on Feb. 28.
The swimmer with the best overall performance throughout the meet was freshman Mia Carbajal, who won three out of four events she competed in, contributing a significant amount of the points the Falcons accrued.
Carbajal is no stranger to the pool, also playing on the Falcons water polo team during the fall season.
The Falcons competed in 15 different swim events throughout the course of the meet, including competitions such as the 1000 meter freestyle, 200 meter butterfly and 200 meter medley relay.
These events vary greatly from water polo games, in which the teams follow a strict set of rules, and each game is relatively similar in structure. As Carbajal states, comparing water polo to swimming is like comparing football to track and field.
“I’m more of a water polo player, I’m not a swimmer, I’m just trying my best out here,” she said.
Carbajal had a first-place finish time of 01:18.12 in the 100 meter breaststroke.
“Most of us played water polo together this past season so we are all really cool,” Carbajal said. “Some of them I went to high school with some of them I played club with so we are all really close.”
In the first event of the conference opener, the Falcons came in first in the 200 meter medley relay. They finished with a time of only 2:08.9.
During the first half of the race the Falcons had a significant lead over their competitors, but in the second half, they slipped and suffered losses against Long Beach City College.
“It’s our first conference double dual meet so we had no idea what the opponents had, what their strengths and weakness were we had to balance, and outspread the event to get the most points possible,” head coach Sergio Macias said.
“Halfway in the meet, we were up by two points, Long Beach strength events were stronger in the second half so we were balanced against Chaffey but strong against Long Beach in the first half.”
The Falcons will compete next Friday at 10 a.m. against Mt. San Antonio ,who will host both the Falcons and Rio Hondo College.
