West High senior Elaina Martz By Susan Harman
Your Prep Sports

CORALVILLE – The heat and humidity were worthy of the State Fair, so it was a great day to go swimming even in mid-September.

West High got the better of rival City High, 111-75 in their annual girls swimming dual at the Coralville Recreation Center Tuesday.

The Women of Troy won eight events, including all three relays, but the races in the middle of the pool between each team’s top swimmers were very competitive.

“I think as a team we swam really well today,” West senior Elaina Martz said. “It was an important competition for us, so that was fun.”

“Relays are one of the best parts because you get to swim with your teammates,” West freshman Lily Ernst said.

City High freshman Carly WeigelThe Little Hawks won four events. Freshman Carly Weigel won the 200 freestyle and the 100 backstroke, while Andrea Adam won the diving and Laura Lorenger took the 100 breaststroke.

“I just think the high-school atmosphere is so fun,” Weigel said. “Everyone’s kind of family.”

Ernst won the 200 individual medley and 100 butterfly and was part of two winning relays for a perfect night. She won both individual events by wide margins. Her second leg in the 400 free relay grabbed the lead away, and West expanded it in the final two legs.

“I swim against (City freshman) Trinity Sadecky a lot in club swimming,” Ernst said. “So I kind of know how to race against her and other people. So I kind of give it my all.”

To be fair, Sadecky swam the 500 freestyle earlier, finishing second, and may have been a bit worse for wear by the final event.

Ernst’s IM time (2:17.80) was the best of the season, but she’s only tried it one other time.

“Backstroke and breaststroke have never been my strong strokes,” Ernst said. “It’s getting better as I swim, so it’s kind of like a progression.”

Martz won the 50 free in a season-best time of 26.07 seconds. She also anchored the winning 200 medley relay and swam on the winning 200 free relay.

“I feel really old,” Martz joked. “We have a lot of really fast freshmen coming in, and the sophomores are getting pretty good too. That’s been fun to watch them and compete with them. Within our own team we’ve got good competition.”

Alleyna Thomas won the 100 free in a season-best 56.75, anchored the winning 200 free relay and was on the winning 400 free relay.

Melanie Housenga won the 500 free, finishing 25 yards ahead of runner-up Sadecky, and swam on the winning medley relay and 400 free relay.

West’s core group of Martz, Thomas, Housenga and Ernst was outstanding.

“They all just love racing, West coach Byron Butler said. “We’re still in that part of the year where we can keep working them really hard and start working on some speed work toward the end of the year. Given how hard our girls have been working, I’m very happy with how our girls swam. But you’re never quite there. We have things to work on.”

City’s Adam, who was 10th at the state meet a year ago, was impressive in the diving competition, nailing several dives of higher difficulty in running away with the event. Coach Zane Hugo said she has won her event in every dual this season.

Weigel won the race of the day, the 100 backstroke, in which she and West’s Housenga dueled the whole way.

“Well, I came off the last wall and I saw Melanie was ahead of me, and I was thinking I don’t have anything to lose, it’s the last 25 (yards),” Weigel said. “I’ll just go and finish as best as I can, and it just happened to be enough. I couldn’t tell until I looked at the board, and I was confused because I couldn’t tell which lane was first.”

Weigel out-touched Housenga, winning in 1:03.35, just .06 ahead of the West junior.

“And then I was like, ‘Oh, that’s cool,’” Weigel said.

She said it was kind of a surprise because she thinks of herself more as a front-runner than a strong finisher.

“She’s a racer,” Hugo said. “So we’re just working on getting some of those finer points cleaned up and working toward the regionals and state meet with her and a couple other girls.”

She also won the 200 freestyle, taking the lead about halfway through and winning by 1.10 seconds over Thomas.

“I could tell some of them were getting kind of tired,” Weigel said. “The third 50 is where people start speeding up so I decided that’s where I’d speed up too.”

“We had some good splits,” Hugo said. “We’re hoping to get all those relays clicking at once. That’s been our struggle this year.”

West 111, City 75
200 Medley Relay – 1. West (Melanie Housenga, Rachel Ding, Jenny Pigge, Elaina Martz) 1:58.65, 2. City (Edie Knoop, Laura Lorenger, Beatric Kearns, Clara Froeschner) 2:06.45, 3. West (Mackenzie Voigt, Izabel Houselog, Megan Arps, Lauren Katz) 2:07.80.

200 Freestyle – 1. Carly Weigel (C) 2:02.98, 2. Alleyna Thomas (W) 2:04.08, 3. Devan O’Rourke (C) 2:05.93, 4. Mae Grahs (W) 2:12.58, 5. Lauren Katz 2:19.74.

200 Individual Medley – 1. Lily Ernst (W) 2:17.80, 2. Laura Loringer (C) 2:24.81, 3. Trinity Sadecky (C) 2:26.25, 4. Jennifer Du (W) 2:30.66, 5. Abigail Caylor (W) 2:37.49.

50 Freestyle – 1. Elaina Martz (W) 26.07, 2. Lauren Whaley (C) 28.51, 3. Izabel Houselog (W) 28.62, 4. Lauren Katz (W) 28.81, 5. Anna Norman-Wickner (C) 29.38.

Diving – 1. Andrea Adam (C) 255.80, 2. Austyn Goodale (W) 155.65, 3. Jena Shaver (W) 141.40, 4. Layna Manjoine (C) 132.82, 5. Allie Schmidt-Morris (W) 131.05.

100 Butterfly – 1. Lily Ernst (W) 1:01.60, 2. Jenny Pigge (W) 1:04.81, 3. Beatric Kearns (C) 1:08.72, 4. Edie Knoop (C) 1:09.90, 5. Mackenzie Voigt (W) 1:12.99.

100 Freestyle – 1. Alleyna Thomas (W) 56.75, 2. Elaina Martz (W) 57.78, 3. Devan O’Rourke (C) 58.09, 4. Mae Grahs (W) 1:00.70, 5. Lauren Whaley (C) 1:01.37.

500 Freestyle – 1. Melanie Housenga (W) 5:26.83, 2. Trinity Sadecky (C) 5:44.65, 3. Beatrice Kearns (C) 5:59.22, 4. Megan Arps (W) 6:07.72, 5. Erin O’Rourke (C) 6:17.10.

200 Freestyle Relay – 1. West (Elaina Martz, Mae Grahs, Lily Ernst, Alleyna Thomas) 1:45.94, 2. City (Carly Weigel, Devan O’Rourke, Lauren Whaley, Trinity Sadecky) 1:47.87, 3. West (Jennifer Du, Rachel Ding, Izabel Houselog, Jenny Pigge) 1:52.55.

100 Backstroke – 1. Carly Weigel (C) 1:03.35, 2. Melanie Housenga (W) 1:03.41, 3. Edie Knoop (C) 1:09.67, 4. Abigail Caylor (W) 1:12.96, 5. Mackenzie Voigt (W) 1:13.58.

100 Breaststroke – 1. Laura Lorenger (C) 1:13.47, 2. Jennifer Du (W) 1:15.21, 3. Rachel Ding (W) 1:15.94, 4. Clara Froeschner (C) 1:16.65, 5. Megan Arps (W) 1:21.08.

400 Freestyle Relay – 1. West (Alleyna Thomas, Lily Ernst, Melanie Housenga, Jennifer Du) 3:53.88, 2. City (Carly Weigel, Trinity Sadecky, Lauren Whaley, Devan O’Rourke) 3:57.97, 3. West (Jenny Pigge, Mae Grahs, Mackenzie Voigt, Lauren Katz) 4:07.22.