The 2023-2024 swim season has just begun, and the Apopka High School swim team has already made us proud. Their first meet was against Colonial High on August 23rd. Both the girls and boys ended up placing 1st. But the team still has a long year ahead of them. The Blue and White interviewed the coaches and some members to see what they expect of this season.
The competition this year is high. While it may seem like Apopka has only one rival school, the team has differing opinions. Coach Seagrave informed us, “… Wekiva is usually seen as our biggest competition, but I think we are more competitive with Edgewater as we have had a long-standing friendly rivalry with their coach.” However, Assistant Coach Russell and some of the swimmers were quick to choose West Orange instead. Regardless of the competition, Apopka’s swim team is confident in their abilities. Coach Seagrave shared that the team’s strongest point is in their numbers. She explained, “The more swimmers on a team, the easier it is to score points.” However, there is always room for improvement. Both coaches agreed the team’s best event is the relays. Yet opinions on the team’s weaker events appear to vary. Junior Deacon Robinson said they need to improve in “any event that involves fly.” Temesgene Berhane, a junior, also picked fly (the butterfly stroke) as their worst event. On the other hand, Coach Russell strongly believes breaststroke needs the most improvement. This season Coach Seagrave wants to focus on technique, especially since swimmers are returning from summer. “Swimming is very technical,” she pointed out, “and small things slow swimmers down, so working on the nitty-gritty details at the beginning is advantageous for us at the end.”
High school swimming is a unique sport. Similar to fencing, multiple events take place at one swim meet and are separated by many factors e.g. the type of stroke used, distance swam, whether it’s individual or team, and more. Some of these events include the 200 freestyle, 100 breaststroke, 100 butterfly, etc. Therefore, the team needs to be skillfully versatile. However, Apopka faces the problem of not owning a pool. Thankfully, practice has not been hindered because the team shares a pool at Camp Wewa with Wekiva. Even though they have found a solution, it comes with a few setbacks. Coach Seagrave explained, “… it is actually a yard pool as opposed to a meter pool, which means my swimmers practice in a shorter pool than most of the rest of the county.” Surprisingly enough, practicing at another pool is not the biggest challenge. “It’s hard to get a bus…” Coach Russell clarified. Although the recent bus driver shortage has made transportation difficult, the team overcomes the slight complication by helping each other out so everyone can get there.
It seems a good bond, lots of practice, and great coaches have made it possible for the swim team to make such achievements this early on in the season. Apopka High is waiting in anticipation to see how far the swim team can go this year.
