Kingswood Oxford’s middle school swim team’s season is coming to an end with a record of 2-5. This season had had a lot of ups and downs, but it had been a very fun experience for the whole team.
Eighth grader Norah Pond enjoyed the season. “Especially this year, I’ve learned how to be adaptable and go with the flow, whether that means doing a dryland workout when a bus doesn’t show up or rushing straight into the pool for a race when we show up for a meet late,” she said. In addition to that, Norah has also learned how to push herself and race against herself, rather than other people. “It really encourages me to go even faster or hold my breath even longer and overall try to do better every day,” she said.
Eighth grader Brigette Russell also found that she has learned a lot from the experience of being on the swim team. “I have learned to work hard and don’t give up because I’ve had to swim hard races and ones I didn’t feel comfortable swimming in, but my coach pushed me to do them, and I did them and I think it has really helped me grow as an athlete and just in general as a person,” she said
Pond and Russell have really enjoyed their three years on the team. “Coming into eighth grade and being on the swim team is my favorite memory probably because as eighth graders we are leaders of the team, and I think that it gives you a lot of responsibility and I think we were ready for it,” Russell said.
Good times during bus rides, and practices made the eighth graders’ last year on the middle school swim team a good one. “The bus rides are some of my favorite memories from this season. We spend a lot of time on buses, driving to practice and meetings, and it’s a great time for us to really connect with each other in a way that we can’t when we’re in the pool with our caps on and our heads underwater,” Pond said. Her favorite memory is when the team won their first swim meet because it was very demonstrative of the improvement the team had made.
Head coach Megan Farrell really enjoyed seeing all of the members of the team grow and learn. “I swam all through my life. I swam up until college so it is definitely one of my passions. It’s something I like to do outside of school on my own as well,” Coach Farrell said.
Coach Farrell loves to work with students and help them discover a love for swimming. “Just seeing their progress, going through the stats and just seeing how much they have improved and how much time they dropped is really rewarding,” she said.
Although the team had encountered a few losses, they had a good win against Hamden Hall. “This season, our meet the other day was a very fun meet where we won against Hamden Hall. There were a lot of great swims, a lot of close races, and we came up on top,” said Coach Farrell. She has really enjoyed coaching this year and looks forward to the seasons to come.
