W. Swimming loses final meet of year

The Quakers could not overcome Army, which was fully tapered and shaved for its championship meet. The Penn women's swimming team (3-8) lost its last dual meet of the season to Army on Saturday. The Quakers beat Army last year but were still expecting a challenge since the Black Knights, like the Quakers, have improved greatly since last year. What Penn didn't know, however, hurt them. "We went in prepared for a very close meet," Penn co-captain Christy Meyer said. "What we didn't know is that Army will have their championship meet in two days. They had already shaved, tapered and completely rested." The Quakers' championship, Easterns, is almost a week later than Army's, and so they have just begun to taper. The point of tapering is to feel rested and ready to swim fast by the day of the meet, but at the beginning tapering is difficult. The decrease in yardage makes the swimmers feel out of shape. As a result, most of Penn's squad did not swim as well as they had last weekend against Johns Hopkins and Harvard. Penn assistant coach Mike Schnur, had said that if the Quakers won three of four key races -- 100-yard backstroke, and the 200-, 500- and 1000-freestyle -- they would win. Of the four, the Red and Blue was only able to capture one. In fact, they only garnered two wins during the whole meet. Freshmen Jamie Taylor and Jenn Walsh won the 500-freestyle and the 200-butterfly respectively. "The obvious disadvantage was that we had to get up really early for a long bus ride," Penn sophomore Lauren Ballough said. "But I think that the main difference between this year and last year -- last year we won -- is Army's freshmen. That class had great depth." Some of the Quakers did step up for this meet and swam well, but they didn't stand out since Army was well-rested and prepared to race. Heather Rouse, for example, performed well in her first attempt at the 100-breaststroke. Usually a freestyler, Rouse decided to swim the 50-breaststroke last week and was successful. Due to these surprising results, Rouse decided to swim the 100-breaststroke at Easterns and wanted to practice once before the championship. Additionally, the Quakers who aren't going to Easterns -- Carrie Van Sykel, Kourtney Krom, Caroline Flood, Sarah Murray and Daily Pennsylvanian writer Heather Reardon -- shaved for Saturday's meet and swam to the best of their ability. Krom swam her fastest 200-butterfly ever. "The five of them stepped up for their last meet of the season and swam better than others on the team," Meyer added. "Many of them swam some of their best times." Penn did not earn the win it was hoping for, but the Quakers have two more weeks to pull everything together and prove to its competitors at Easterns that they have made great improvements this season. After all, seeing is believing, and they have not shown much yet.

Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The Daily Pennsylvanian.