2011 Swim Team Party and Banquet

The Seven Hills swim team season has come to a close.  But here are some great pics from the recent team party and banquet.  Way to go, Barracudas!  What a great season!

With the TENTH consecutive City Meet win, the Seven Hills hillside reads: 7HX (Seven Hills 10)

As not to break tradition, the kids fill it in!

Cooper off the high board

Coach Amy gives her celebration speech after winning both the City and League Championships

Coach Amy's Retirement Gift: a quilt with every team and city meet shirt from the past 15 years

Cooper and his buddy Quinn with Coach Garner

The victory dance

Ivy and sweet Sydney at the banquet

Cooper gets his City Meet medal: 3rd place in the boys' 6 & Under Freestyle Relay

Ivy and her "feather" she got at the team party.  The older girls thought she just HAD to have one!

Cooper and the 6 & Under boys at the team banquet

A retirement cake for Coaches Amy and Garner

Cooper and one of his favorite junior coaches, Rocky

 

NSL City Swim Meet - 7/23/2011

Barracudas, Barracudas, Chomp Chomp Chomp!

This weekend is the Nashville Swim League City Meet which is being held at the Centennial Sportsplex.  10 & unders swam yesterday and the 11 & ups will swim today. 

It was an amazing (and very long) day and Cole & Cooper both swam their tails off.  Seven Hills has been the City Meet Champion for 9 years in a row and is going for win #10!  We were the AAAA League Champions this year, as well, so we have a good chance of pulling it off!

As usual, "Giddy" was there all day - arriving at 6:15am - and grabbed the best seats in the house

(right under the air conditioner!)  The meet didn't end until 6pm so it was quite a long day!

(Thanks for being there, Ma!)

Cooper and Giddy at the top of the bleachers.  What?  You don't feed your kid Pringles for breakfast?

Coach Amy and Coach Garner (who are, sadly, both retiring after this season)

  

To kick off the meet, the National Anthem was sung while a team of 6 & Unders slowly carried the American Flag down  each lane of the pool.  TEARJERKER!  Don't they know that, with as little sleep I had and only ONE gulped down cup of coffee that they can't do that to a patriotic gal such as myself at that ghastly hour?  Anyway, I appeared to be the only one crying (Giddy was outside or she would have flooded the place) but had no shame given the awesomeness of it all.

  

 

COOPER

The 6 & Under portion of the meet started at 8am - requiring all swimmers on deck for warm-ups at 6:50am.  WHEW!  Cooper, being 5, had his work cut out for him since he is young for his age group.

BUT, he was amazing and the results are as follows:

• 6 & Under Boys 25 Freestyle (heat #9, lane #3)
• Time: 38.44
• Ranking: #70 out of 116 boys

• 6 & Under Boys 25 Backstroke (heat #6, lane #6)
• Time: 38.93 (a personal best down from 46.02)
• Ranking: #43 out of 104 boys

•  6 & Under Boys "A" Freestyle Relay (heat #3, lane #8)
• Ranking: #7 (he'll get an award for this at the banquet tomorrow night!)

Event number/Heat number/lane number

Cooper at the Clerk of Course.  Shocking green cap makes our swimmers easy to spot!

Cooper has a question before, during, and after every race.  He is our inquisitive child.

 On Friday, Coach Amy told Cooper to stay under water as long as he could after diving in before coming up to swim.  What she meant is to "streamline" after his dive which they have been working on in practice.  But, Cooper's little ears heard "stay under water" so he swam 3/4 of the pool

under water before surfacing to finish the freestyle race.

Here he is (lane 3 from the top) right before he surfaced for the first time. 

Cooper gets a participation medal after his first race!

Cooper at the Clerk of Course before backstroke

Ready to race

Backstroke (the green cap is Cooper)

Cooper (lane 6) nearly won his race...but was just out-touched by the dude in lane 2 (top).

COLE 

 

The 7-10 age group portion of the meet started at 12pm - requiring all swimmers on deck for warm-ups at 10:30am.  Cole moved up to the 9-10 division this season so, like Cooper, is at the bottom of his agegroup.  A strong competitor in every sport, Cole did very well and his results are as follows:

• 9-10 Boys 25 Freestyle (heat #16, lane #5)
• Time: 16.40
• Ranking: #23 out of 144 boys
  

• 9-10 Boys 25 Backstroke (heat #12, lane #8)
• Time: 22.15 (a personal best down from 23.16)
  
• Ranking: #35 out of 117 boys

• 9-10 Boys 25 Breaststroke (heat #9, lane #7)
• Time: 24.93 (a personal best down from 26.91)
• Ranking: #35 out of 106 boys

• 9-10 Boys 100 Individual Medley (heat #11, lane #5)
• Time: 1:45.06
• Ranking: #24 out of 102 boys

•  9-10 Boys "A" Freestyle Relay (swam the 3rd leg)
• Ranking: #3 (he'll get an award for this at the banquet tomorrow night!) 

•  9-10 Boys "B" Medley Relay (swam the butterfly leg)
• Ranking: #8 (he'll get an award for this at the banquet tomorrow night!)
  

Cole in the center with a strong start for 25 Freestyle

Lots of competition in the backstroke.  He looked great the entire way!

 Though the competition is amazing and the exercise is even better, our favorite thing about being at Seven Hills are the friends we've made!  The core of summertime: SWIM TEAM!

Cole with his buddy, Tom

Cooper with his pal, Sam

Ribbons and Medals Galore - Oh My!

I wanted to share a picture of Cooper with his beautiful new bulletin board full of this Summer's awards.  He is so proud to have his own display that shows how hard he worked this year!

Not bad for a 4 year old!

Way to go, Coop!

Surrounded by Champions!

Seven Hills wins City Meet!

For the 9th consecutive year, Seven Hills is the City Champion and brought home the trophy for the big end-of-meet party at the club.  As in years past, they mowed a message in the hillside and this year it says: 7 Hills Again!  Way to go, Barracudas!

Monday night was the swim team banquet where they give participation trophies, City Meet medals, and individual recognition awards.  Cooper was super excited to get his medal for placing 8th in the City on his Freestyle Relay.  He also got a participation trophy for being on the team but he didn't want to take a picture with it because it was "too small."  He apparently was expecting a life-sized trophy.

Cole also collected his City Meet bounty - 5 medals and a ribbon - from placing in every event.  If you didn't see the update the other day, the results of the relays ended in 3rd in the Medley and 4th in the Free.  WOW!  After each member of his group of 7-8 swimmers was called to the stage to receive their participation trophy, Cole was singled out as the 7-8 Boys Most Valuable Swimmer!  WOW!

Cole with his amazing Coach Amy Caulkins

(Amy was recently named Southeastern Age-Group Coach of the Year

which includes Tennessee, Alabama and the panhandle of Florida)

On another note, here is Ivy in her new applique shirt to match the skirt.  What a doll baby!