Country Club 2nd at Indiana Meet

Sunday, July 20, 2008

The Madisonville Golf and Country Club Sharks swim team placed second in the first of two season championships earlier this week, but boasted many great individual showings.

Ten separate swimmers took home first-place honors in a well-balanced effort, but lost to Evansville Country Club at Mount Vernon, Ind. on Wednesday.

“We have a lot of new swimmers on the club this year so it was refreshing to see a lot of them being able to contribute to our success,” Sharks coach Jason Clark said.

Swimmer John Hilkner paced the club with three individual wins, including a new meet record, 27.10 seconds, in the boys 14-and-under 50 freestyle.

Hilkner, who participated in a swim camp at Auburn University this summer, continued to impress his coach with his progress.

“He’s really kind of come into his own,” Clark said. I think he realized that now this a sport in which he is really, really good.

“He’s really starting to realize that if he devotes his time and efforts to this that he could really be something special.”

This fall, Hilkner, a freshman, will begin his second year as a swimmer at Madisonville-North Hopkins High School under Clark.

“You’ll be seeing his name a lot this fall,” he said.

As Hilkner’s high school career just begins, Joseph and Stephen Porter’s came one step closer to ending after the meet.

The brothers, 2008 graduates from North, will both swim for Transylvania University in the fall.
“I’m just really happy for them,” Clark said. “I think now, at the end of it, before they enter their collegiate career, they realize they are good swimmers in their own right.”

Stephen took two individual top honors and the brothers combined with E.J. Quijano and Yunan Yang to set new meet records for the 200 medley relay and 200 freestyle relay, a goal the group set earlier in the summer.

The girls’ side also made the meet a family affair. Sisters Carli and Ellen Wittington broke a meet record on the 200 medley relay by four seconds, but placed second.

Carli won the open 50 breaststroke and open 50 backstroke. Ellen broke another record in the open 50 fly, but came in second place. The sisters finished third and fourth in the open 50 freestyle, with Ellen edging Carli by less than two-tenths of a second.

“They’re just very driven girls,” Clark said. “I always know every time I put them in the water something special is going to happen and they don’t let me down.”

Kendall Atkins and Morgan P’Pool also stood out on the girls’ team as first-year swimmers, Clark said.

Individually, Atkins and P’Pool each made three appearances in final events. Atkins also reached the finals in five separate relays and P’Pool made two final relay teams.

The Sharks will be back in action today in the finals of the South-Central Conference Championships in Greenville.