Woodbridge’s Chad Hundeby Nearly Steals the Show in 2-A Championships

Moments after he just missed qualifying for the Olympic trials Saturday, Woodbridge High School sophomore Chad Hundeby pulled his shaved, dripping body out of the pool and disappeared into a gaggle of colored goggles and bathing caps. He may soon find anonymity difficult even in that kind of camouflage.

The record will show that Calabasas High School won the 100-yard backstroke, 200-yard individual medley and 200-yard medley relay for its runaway victory in the Southern Section 2-A boys’ swimming championships at Long Beach’s Belmont Plaza Pool. Calabasas scored 127 points, and Brea-Olinda was second with 89.

It will also show that Miraleste, led by Jerret Winter--who had a first-place time of 21.11 after he set a Southern Section 50-yard freestyle record of 20.09 seconds in Friday’s preliminaries--was third with 82 points.

And it will also show that a depth-rich Brea-Olinda girls’ team won the Southern Section 2-A championship in spite of placing first in just two events (Denise Weber in the 200 free in 1:53.15 and the 400 freestyle relay team in 3:38.89). The Wildcats rolled up 149 points to runner-up Paso Robles’ 136 and third-place Trabuco Hills’ 65.

Hundeby, 16, was the outstanding swimmer of the meet. He swam the 200-yard freestyle in 1:38.71, breaking the old record by almost eight-tenths of a second and approaching the Olympic trials qualifying mark of 1:37.69.

Five events later, he swam the 500-yard freestyle in 4:25.92, bettering Walter Beddeo’s seven-year-old Southern Section record by more than 2 1/2 seconds, and automatically qualifying as All-American in that event.

Hundeby finished the grueling day swimming 46.61 in the first leg of Woodbridge’s 400-yard freestyle relay team. Although Woodbridge managed only ninth place in the event, Hundeby’s 46.61 split time was the second fastest of all classes at the meet and qualified him for All-American consideration. He contributed 40 of the 64 points Woodbridge would score in its fifth-place finish.