The men and women’s swimming and diving teams finished President’s Day weekend with a second-place finish for the women and a third-place finish for the men at the Atlantic 10 Championships held in Buffalo, N.Y. The men finished the competition in third behind Massachusetts and St. Bonaventure with a score of 478 points. The GW women finished with a score of 694.50, just 25 points shy of a first-place finisher UMass.
GW finished with 11 individual-event victories and two relay-team victories. Senior Alvaro Fortuny broke the A-10 record in the 100-yard breaststroke twice Friday, first with a time of :55.34 then with :54.65. Fortuny’s second time set a pool record and qualifies him for the NCAAs held March 22-24 at College Station, Texas. Saturday, Fortuny finished close behind UMass’s Billy Brown, who set an A-10 record in the 200-yard breaststroke with a time of 1:58.66.
GW freshman Ruth Dubyel won the 100-yard backstroke with a time of :58.41, and broke the school record Friday, winning the 100-yard butterfly with a time of :56.97. She finished second Saturday in the 200-yard backstroke and 200-yard butterfly events. Dubyel was the second GW freshman swimmer to win two events. Teammate Kristen Fagley won both the 200-yard freestyle and the 500-yard freestyle on the meet’s opening day.
Junior Nell Friar defended her position as A-10 champion by winning the 100-yard breaststroke Friday with a time of 1:04.94, setting a school record in the process. She came back just as strong Saturday, winning the 200-yard breaststroke. Freshmen Crystal Freeman and sophomore David Dillehay both won the 1650-yard freestyle for the women’s and men’s teams, respectively. Freeman was also a member of the relay team, along with juniors Jocelyn Finch, Laura Najjar and Fagley, that won the 800-yard freestyle relay
GW senior Wes Teter finished second in the 100-yard backstroke, but set a school record of 1:39.12 in his second-place 200-yard freestyle finish. Senior Jeremy Hoders finished second in the three-meter diving event.
