The Eden Prairie High School (EPHS) synchronized swim team placed second overall, and all routines advanced to the state meet following a competition on May 17.
Swimmers whose routines ranked in the top four, qualifying them for the May 22-23 state competition, are as follows:
- Grace Proper placed first in extended solos.
- Grace Proper placed first, and Ingrid Karlin placed fifth in long figures.
- Ingrid Karlin placed second in long solos.
- Esther Olajos and Lydia Wattengel placed second in short duets.
- Ingrid Karlin and Grace Proper placed second in long duets.
- Aslihan Erisgen, Hannah Larsen and Lilly Pearson placed third in long trios.
- Ingrid Karlin, Hannah Larsen, Lauren Mertz, Lilly Pearson, Grace Proper and Lydia Wattengel placed third in extended teams.
- Esther Olajos placed third, and Lydia Wattengel placed fourth in short figures.
- Sophia Eibon, Audrey Foster, Océane Gattung and Mathilde Vedsted placed fourth in short teams.
- Lydia Wattengel placed fourth in short solos.
Also, Lauren Mertz placed fifth in long solos, which qualifies her to pre-swim at state, and Grace Proper placed sixth in extended figures.
Both the May 17 section meet and this week’s state meet are divided into two parts: a figures portion, where swimmers perform individual skills, and a routines portion, which is what most people think of when they picture the sport – choreographed routines set to music. Scores are determined by combining each swimmer’s figure and routine scores, with 50% from each used to calculate a final composite score.
Routines that place in the top four go on to compete at the state meet on Thursday and Friday. Fifth-place swimmers pre-swim, meaning they do not compete but swim before the other athletes in their event to provide judges with a baseline.
Co-head coaches for the EPHS synchronized swim team are Faith Cornish and Tori Anderson, with Sarah Torgerson as assistant coach.
“This is the best our team has done in years, and it is super rare for our entire team to go on to the state meet,” Cornish said. “Our team has had a lot of injuries and hurdles this season, so overcoming those and having this amazing outcome is really exciting for our team!”
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