Photo by Lexi Coon
Vestavia Hills’ Grace Uldrich swims the 100-yard backstroke during the 2017 AHSAA swimming and diving state championship.
During the first weekend in December, the Vestavia Hills High School swimming and diving team competed in the AHSAA Class 6A/7A state championships at Auburn University, where 15 athletes qualified for finals.
Both Grace Uldrich and Sam Campbell placed well in the girls and boys 50-yard freestyle, earning sixth (24.82 seconds) and fourth (22.26), respectively. Uldrich also placed eighth in the 100-yard backstroke, tying her preliminary time of 1:00.04.
Teammate Christopher Rubin swam the 100-yard backstroke, too, and placed fifth (53.61). Earlier in the day he earned fourth in the 100-yard butterfly with 52.60, more than half a second faster than his prelims swim.
Two Rebels swam in the girls 500-yard freestyle. Sydney Nelson and Maddie Hunsberger placed eighth (5:22.72) and ninth (5:23.79), respectively. Nelson and Hunsberger also finaled in the 200-yard freestyle, placing 12th (2:01.31) and 13th (2:01.71), while teammate Adeline Carroll earned eighth with a time of 1:57.54.
On the boys side, Nick Velezis placed 12th (1:48.26) in the 200-yard freestyle and 12th in the 500-yard freestyle (5:01.96).
Carroll later came in 11th in the 100-yard breaststroke (1:09.86), and teammate Rebecca Chow-Wah earned 14th in the 100-yard freestyle (57.25).
Vestavia Hills’ relays saw good swims as well, with the girls 200-yard medley team of Hunsberger, Chow-Wah, Gabrielle Velezis and Anne Lauren Ingram placing 14th (2:02.08) and the boys relay of Rubin, Campbell, Nick Velezis and Jonathan Huang earning seventh (1:43.13).
Carroll, Chow-Wah, Nelson and Uldrich later took second in the 200-yard freestyle relay, after dropping about a second and a half from their prelims swim to go 1:40.62, and the boys relay of Huang, Peter Shields, Shane Mackey and Chip Hwang placed 16th (1:38.33).
The Rebels finished off the meet with the 400-yard freestyle relay, during which the girls team of Carroll, Hunsberger, Nelson and Uldrich dropped nearly two seconds to swim 3:42.15 and earn fourth. The boys relay of Mackey, Shields, Nick Velezis and Rubin took 16th (3:28.00).
VHHS divers Michael Helton and Chance Stephenson took 10th and 16th overall in the boys 1-meter diving.
