GCS Swimming

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Week of November 6

Approximately 250 swimmers representing 23 schools from all over Texas came together on Saturday November 3rd to compete in the Colleyville Christian Fall Invitational Swim Meet held in Grapevine, TX. There were some really close races and lots of personal best times were achieved.

The Grace Junior High Boys Team were able to capture 1st place in the Junior High Division and our Grace Junior High Girls team won 2nd place in their division.

Both the girls and boys teams were able to bring home the gold with their relay events.

The Girls 200 Medley Relay: Won by .2 of a second over Middle Schools of Grandbury. The team was composed of Isabella Hayes, Ashley Taylor, Blakely Roseberry and Jennifer Montier.

Girls 200 Freestyle Relay: Again a very close race winning by a mere .06 of a second. Making up the free relay were: Ashley Taylor, Jennifer Montier, Isabella Hayes and Blakely Roseberry.

Boys 200 Medley Relay: 1st by over 9 seconds. Members of the relay were: Jackson Turner, Michael Green, Seth Wilson, Caden White.

Boys 200 Freestyle Relay: 1st by over 10 seconds. Members of the free relay were: Caden White, Noah Loyd, Seth Wilson, and Michael Green.

Individual Accomplishments:
Girls:
Blakely Roseberry (8)-1st 50 backstroke, 1st 50 butterfly
Ashley Taylor (8)-2nd 50 Freestyle, 2nd 50 breaststroke
Jennifer Montier (6)-2nd 50 Backstroke, 2nd 50 butterfly

Emalee Dupuis (7)- 4th 100 IM, 10th 100

Breaststroke

Isabella Hayes(7)- 14th 100 Freestyle, 14th 50 Backstroke

Sidney Boone (6)-12th 100 Breaststroke

Kayla Minick (6)- 20th 100 Freestyle

Jenna Wortham (6)-11th 50 Breaststroke, 20th 50 Backstroke

Boys:
Michael Green (8)-1st 50 backstroke, 1st 50 Breaststroke
Caden White (7)-2nd 100 Freestyle, 2nd 50 Freestyle
Seth Wilson (7)-1st 50 Butterfly, 6th 100 IM

Noah Loyd (8)- 7th 100 IM, 9th 100 Freestyle

Jackson Turner (8)-5th 100 IM, 5th 50 Backstroke

Caleb Wilson (8)- 17th 50 Free, 24th 100 Freestyle

High School Individual Results:

GIRLS:
Lilligrace Bazzell (9): 3rd 200 Individual Medley, 4th 100 Backstroke
Bailey Nickels (11): 18th 50 Freestyle , 21st 100 Freestyle
BOYS:
Elijah Braun (10):4th 100 Butterfly, 7th 100 Backstroke
Joshua Barry (9): 3rd 100 Backstroke, 6th 100 Freestyle
Kaden Kozsuch (9): 1st 100 Breaststroke, 8th 200 Freestyle

The next meet for the High School swimmers will be a preliminary/ final meet in Texarkana TX on November 16-17. The next meet for the Junior High Swimmers will be Saturday December 1st at The Colony.

Week of November 19

Grace swimmers traveled to Texarkana this past weekend to compete in the Texas Interscholastic Swim Coaches Association (TISCA) Invitational Swim Meet. There were almost 600 swimmers from 22 different 4A, 5A and 6A public schools. Grace took 6 swimmers, 2 girls and 4 boys.

Bailey Nickels and Liligrace Bazzell competed in the girls division. Bailey (11th), had a personal best time in the 100 free and Liligrace (9th) was able to place in the top 25 in her two events.

In the boys division, the 4 boys, Elijah Braun (10), Joshua Barry (9), Eli Coffey (9), and Kaden
Kozsuch (9), were able to better their 200 Medley Relay time by 6 seconds and their 200 Free
Relay by 4 seconds. Both relays placed in the top 20. All the boys had personal best times in
their individual events and raced exceptionally well.

The TISCA meet was the fastest meet the swimmers have been to this season and it ended up
being a great experience for them. It was wonderful to see some fast racing and set our goals
for the Regional and State Meets coming the end of January and beginning of February.
GLORY TO THE LORD!!!

Week of December 17

The High School swim team had a very busy week last week. On Thursday morning, they competed in a relay meet hosted by Whitehouse High School. The swimmers competed against some highly ranked public schools in the East Texas Area. Swimmers competing were Bailey Nickels(11), Elijah Braun (10), Joshua Barry(9), Liligrace Bazzell(9), Eli Coffey (9) and Kaden Kozsuch.

Relay Highlights:

3rd-Mixed 200 Medley Relay-L. Bazzell, K. Kozsuch, E. Braun, J. Barry

7th-200 Mixed Butterfly Relay-E. Coffey, E. Braun, B. Nickels

6th-200 Mixed Freestyle Relay-K. Kozsuch, L. Bazzell, E. Coffey, K. Kozsuch

3rd-200 Mixed Backstroke Relay-L. Bazzell, J. Barry, K. Kozsuch

12th-200 Breaststroke Relay-B. Nickels, J. Barry, E. Coffey

5th-400 Mixed Freestyle Relay-E. Braun, L. Bazzell, J. Barry, E. Coffey

On Saturday, the JH and HS swimmers travelled to Granbury to compete in the Candy Cane Invitational. Team points were not calculated in this meet, but the Grace swimmers swam exceptionally well with many personal best times being achieved.

HS Highlights;

Bailey Nickels: 6th 50 Freestyle, 8th 100 Freestyle

Joshua Barry: 5th 100 Freestyle

Elijah Braun: 2nd 100 Butterfly, 7th 100 Freestyle

K. Kozsuch: 4th 100 Freestyle, 3rd 100 Breaststroke

Eli Coffey: 3rd 50 Freestyle, 5th 100 Breaststroke

3rd Men’s 200 Medley Relay: Barry, Kozsuch, Braun, Coffey

1st. Men’s 400 Freestyle Relay: Barry, Braun, Coffey, Kozsuch

JH Highlights:

Blakely Roseberry: 1st 100 Individual Medley, 1st 50 Freestyle

Ashley Taylor: 4th 100 Individual Medley, 3rd 50 Freestyle

Isabella Hayes; 12th 50 Freestyle, 8th 50 Breaststroke

Sidney Boone; 16th 50 Freestyle, 10th 50 Breaststroke

Emalee Dupuis: 6th 50 Backstroke, 6th 50 Breaststroke

Kayla Minick: 9th 50 Breaststroke, 20th 50 Freestyle

2nd Girls 200 Medley Relay-E. Dupuis, A. Taylor, B. Roseberry, I. Hayes

Michael Green: 1st 100 Freestyle, 1st 50 Backstroke

Caden White: 2nd 100 Freestyle, 2nd 50 Freestyles

Jackson Turner: 10th 100 Freestyle, 3rd 50 Backstroke

Seth Wilson; 3rd 100 Individual Medley, 1st 50 Butterfly

Caleb Wilson: 8th 50 Freestyle

Noah Loyd: 4th 100 Individual Medley, 3rd 50 Breaststroke

1st: 200 Medley Relay-J. Turner, M. Green, S. Wilson, C. White

1st: 200 Freestyle Relay-C. White, S. Wilson, N. Loyd, M. Green

Swimmers will be working hard over the holidays getting ready for Regionals and State in January. The next high school meet will be on January 5th in Lufkin.

Week of January 8

Grace High School Swimmers ended their Christmas break with an invitational meet hosted by Hudson High School at the Lufkin Swim Center. Fifteen teams from East Texas and Houston areas of the state attended the meet. Grace Community swimmers performed pretty well with some having their best times for the season.
Scoring for the team included:
Girls:
Bailey Nickels-8th 50 Freestyle and 13th 100 Freestyle

Boys:

Elijah Braun-9th 100 Butterfly and 11th 100 Backstroke
Joshua Barry-4th 200 Individual Medley and 6th 100 Backstroke
Kaden Kozsuch-7th 200 Freestyle and 8th 100 Breaststroke

Swimmers have a Pre-Regional and JV Championship meet coming up this Saturday, January 12th in Lewisville. It will be the last meet before Regionals which will be held in Mansfield on Friday January 25th.

Week of January 14

Grace swimmers traveled to The Colony on Saturday to compete in The Pre-Regional and JV Championships. The swimmers had an excellent meet, getting best times in most of their events. Over 300 swimmers competed in this meet representing twenty two private schools from all over Texas. Grace swimmer results:

Girls:

Bailey Nickels-25th in the 50yard Freestyle and 15th in the 100 yard Freestyle

Liligrace Bazzell- 15th in the 100 yard Freestyle and 10th in the 100 yard Backstroke

Boys:

Joshua Barry-4th in the 200 yard Individual Medley and 2nd in the 100 yard Backstroke

Elijah Braun-4th in the 100 yard Butterfly and 7th in the 100 Backstroke

Eli Coffey- 17th in the 50 yard Freestyle and 12th on the 100 yard Breaststroke

Kaden Kozsuch-16th in the 50 Freestyle and 7th in the 100 Breaststroke

The boys also swam in the 200 and 400 yard Freestyle Relays placing 6th in both relays.

Swimmers next meet will be on Friday January 25th in Mansfield.

Schedule

Nothing from February 21, 2019 to March 21, 2019.

Janet Taylor

Head Coach

Coach Taylor graduated from Texas Christian University with a degree in Kinesiology and a minor in Biology. She competed in three sports while in college: swimming, gymnastics, and golf. One of her first jobs out of college was coaching the women’s swim team at TCU. She did this for two years before marrying her husband, Mark. They have three sons (all Cougars), and three granddaughters.
Coaching swimming has been her passion for the last 30+ years. She has coached swimming at all levels, from summer league to Olympic trials qualifiers. The best part of coaching at Grace is being able to bring God’s Word into every practice and watch each athlete not only improve physically, but mature spiritually.

Jason Montier

JH Swim

Jason has been the junior high/high school orchestra director since 2010, the junior high/high school band director since 2014, and the junior high/high school cross country coach since 2013. He has served as National Honor Society advisor and shotgun team advisor. Since he has been at Grace, the instrumental program has won three Texas Association for Private and Parochial Schools (TAPPS) instrumental state championships. He also serves as the TAPPS state music chair. Jason received his B.S. in Music Education from East Central University, where he met his wife, Angela. They have three daughters who attend Grace. Jason is an avid outdoorsman who loves to hunt and manage conservation lands. He is also a seasoned runner who has completed six marathons and an ultra-marathon 50K, and many other races. One of his favorite races is the Rose City Triathlon where he competed individually, but also enjoys putting together relay teams stacked with several of his students.