Fountain Valley girls, Newport Harbor boys earn runner-up finishes at Surf League swim finals
It was a teachable moment.
The good thing is, Fountain Valley High freshman Kaitlyn Nguyen will get another chance to shine next week.
Nguyen was nearly a double-event winner Friday at the Surf League swim finals at Golden West College. She surged to a win in the 200-yard individual medley in a personal-best time of 2 minutes, 1.94 seconds and appeared poised to win the 100 breaststroke as well.
The top-seeded Nguyen touched first in the latter event in 1:03.02 but ended up being disqualified because of an illegal kick.
She was consoled by Fountain Valley teammates and coach Christine Locke, and even her Irvine Novaquatics club teammate Milan Bever of CdM.
“You’re only a freshman,” Bever told Nguyen after hugging her friend. “Do you know how insane it is to even go 1:03?”
After warming down — and calming down — Nguyen seemed even more resolute for next week’s CIF Southern Section Division 1 finals at Mission Viejo’s Marguerite Aquatics Complex. She plans to swim both events there as well.
“I’ve never gotten DQ’ed in that race before,” she said. “It just came as a surprise to me. Thinking back, I still can’t recall doing that, but it is what it is.
“These high school meets are less pressure, and I think do better in this environment. I’m around all my friends, so it’s definitely more enjoyable.”
Nguyen said she was very happy with her time in the individual medley, a race where she was pushed by second-place finisher Iris Bayan of Los Alamitos in the first 100 meters. And she also had to be pleased with the Barons’ team finish.
Los Alamitos repeated as Surf League champion in both genders, with the Griffins girls earning 484 points and the boys 370 points. The Fountain Valley girls (266 points) and Newport Harbor boys (300) each finished runner-up.
Fountain Valley’s girls finished second in both the 200 medley relay (Emme Nguyen, Kaitlyn Nguyen, Yen Dang and Phoebe Munholland touched in 1:47.81) and the 200 free relay (Reese Meister, Leyna Nguyen, Kaitlyn Nguyen and Munholland touched in 1:37.96). Munholland earned a second-place individual finish in the 50 free.
CdM’s girls, who finished third, might have competed with Los Alamitos with both teams at full strength. But they decidedly weren’t. CdM junior standout Maggie Schalow is competing at the Phillips 66 International Team Trials in North Carolina. Fellow junior Jillian Schlom, the top preliminaries qualifier in both the 50 and 100 free, was out sick.
Still, the Sea Kings girls had some solid swims. Bever finished third in the 200 free and backstroke. Club swimmer Nikki Lahey, a freshman, was the runner-up in the 100 free and placed third in the 50 free. In the 100 free, she was just out-touched by Los Alamitos’ Isabel Valaika in Lane 7.
“I’m just focusing on improving my times, and it is a lot of fun,” Lahey said. “I thought I did pretty well, since I’m a freshman.”
Newport Harbor’s boys’ team features mostly water polo players. Four of them — junior Finn Genc, junior Finn LeSieur, senior Will Fosselman and senior Mason Hunt — managed to win the 200 free relay in 1:27.61.
Hunt, a Newport Harbor valedictorian bound for Harvard, finished third in both the 100 free and 200 free.
“It’s fun to just have one more ride with the guys,” he said. “It’s always interesting going against legitimate swimmers, but it’s good to spend a little bit more time competing with the guys I’ve been playing water polo with for so long. Even though there aren’t two goals on the ends of the pool, it’s still the same pool, still the same sort of energy and fun that surrounds it.”
Genc was second in the 200 free and third in the 500 free, a race where Newport freshman Aidan Arie placed second.
CdM’s Evan Lim won the breaststroke (56.92) and finished second in the butterfly. The Sea Kings’ Mason Kubichek won the individual medley (1:52.17) and finished second to Lim in the breast.
CdM sophomore Camren Simoncelli finished second in one of the more exciting races of the day, the 100 free, won by Los Alamitos’ Jake Lugehbuehl by two-hundredths of a second (46.88 to 46.90).
Fountain Valley’s Tyler Vuong and Justin Chen earned runner-up finishes in the 50 free and backstroke, respectively.
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