Lancers' Honsa makes it look easy
Bryant Honsa has been one of the state's best distance freestyle swimmers all season. The Lake Park senior used Saturday's St. Charles East sectional to show just how good he is as the year draws to a close.
Honsa won both the 200-yard freestyle and the 500 freestyle and qualified with two Lancers relays to help lead the team's charge toward next week's state finals at New Trier.
"I hope to drop a lot in the next week and hopefully I'll swim well on Friday and Saturday," Honsa said.
St. Charles East's sectional was the fastest in the state this year. The meet qualified a state-best 66 swimmers.
"My freshman year, there were only three or four people making it per event," Honsa said. "It takes more than the state time to go top six. A lot of people who had the state time didn't get medals for it."
Far from being disappointed with the in-water speed of the meet, Honsa was like the other fans when he wasn't swimming - marveling at the performances. Eight swimmers qualified in the 200 individual medley and the 200 freestyle - the best performances by any sectional field in the state.
"It's just great," Honsa said.
Honsa was pushed in the 500 freestyle by DeKalb's David Gordon, who eventually faded and finished three seconds back of Honsa's 4:36.34 time in second place.
"He was pushing me," Honsa said. "I hadn't planned on taking it out that fast, but he was there with me. He went 4:39 - under 4:40 - and that was good to see."
Honsa's 1:40.24 winning time in the 200 freestyle set a pool record at the Norris Center - one of five pool records Saturday.
"This might be my last meet here at St. Charles East," Honsa said. "I've been swimming here since I was 8 years old. It's unbelievable that this is my last time."
Lake Park also qualified Aaron Casper in the 50 freestyle while Nathan Schingoethe qualified in the 100 backstroke and Marcus Julian advanced in the 100 breastroke. The qualifying relays were the 200 medley relay and the 200 freestyle relay.
Wheaton co-op hit the early events of the meet with a vengeance. First the 200 medley relay qualified. Then Carl Sveen and Sean Brown advanced in the 200 freestyle. Dan Long and Ryan Frederickson maintained the 100 percent qualification record in the 200 individual medley.
That pace was not sustainable, but Wheaton also qualified Collin Hogan in the 100 butterfly and the 100 backstroke, Sveen and Brown in the 500 freestyle, Frederickson in the 100 breastroke and finished the meet when its 400 freestyle relay qualified.
"We did a lot better than I think was expected of us," Sveen said. "We started qualifying the relay and both in the 200 free and the 200 IM and we had awesome drops in all of them. We're having an awesome meet."
In addition to its swimming success, divers George Doran and Mark Ciesielski went 1-2.
Those good times could continue next week at the state meet in New Trier. While the sectional is a goal for many swimmers, Sveen said his eyes are now planted on what me might achieve against the best in the state.
"I'm tapering for state," he said. "I came here and I wanted to get my cuts and try to place high and get some points and then go home and get ready for next weekend."
The Sveen-Brown partnership has served Wheaton well this winter.
"We're a good duo," Sveen said. "We swim the same events. We both went about the same times today. He got me in the 200 and I beat him in the 500, but it's just friendly competition."
Personally, Sveen said his times were good, but there is still room for improvement. The resting process that produces those time drops is always accompanied by a shift in training focus toward cleaning up the little things that might give an athlete a crucial tenth or hundredth of a second in extra speed."
"I'm dropping a lot of time," Sveen said. "I had my best in-season times. I'm not rested. I'm not shaved. We've been waiting for state since the beginning of last summer. I'm really excited and (Brown's) really excited and I think we're going to see some really great swims next week."