NORTHFIELD, Minn.- The Carleton women’s swimming and diving team spent the day tuning up for the season in the Cows, Colleges, and Contentment Classic, hosted by St. Olaf College. The non-scored invitation included the Knights, Oles, and UW Lacrosse. As a non-scored meet, Carleton was presented with the unique opportunity to experiment with swimmers outside of their usual events.
The team’s performance was headlined by the efforts of Maggie Alexander (So./Tigard, Ore./Tualatin) and her sister Kate Alexander (Sr./Tualatin, Ore./Tualatin). Maggie placed first in the 1650-yard freestyle with a time of 18:44.43, while Kate conquered the competition in the 200-yard backstroke in 2:17.78. Kate’s closest competitor was first-year teammate Maddie Epping (Eden Prairie, Minn.), who captured second place with a time of 2:19.26.
Head coach Andy Clark was strongly encouraged by the team’s performance at the Classic, saying “After an exciting home dual meet last night, a meet like today, one without scoring and one where team members are swimming in many off events, it could be easy for the teams to lose focus and supportive energy for each other. It was great to see that was not the case for either squad and people not only swam well but were cheering each other on throughout a long day of swimming.
"Back to back meets are both emotionally and physically tough, especially early in the season when fitness levels are still being developed, but both teams did an excellent job of maintaining momentum and it paid off with some strong early season performances."
The Knights will next take part in the Ted Mullin Hour of Power Relay for Cancer Research on Tuesday, Nov. 10.