LAKE ASBURY - Orange Park High boys' sprint swimming team dominated the Rolling Hills pool with fast wins in the 50 free, second and fourth place finishes in the 100 free, and a final gold in the 400 free relay to take a tri-meet win over Clay and Pedro Menendez high schools on Thursday, Sept. 11.
For the girls, Clay High had top finishes behind state qualifier Kylie Elrod and teammate Haley Hajost as the Lady Blue Devils dominated convincingly.
In the 50 free, Orange Park's Ashton Juarez battled to the wall first with Clay's Jackson Dalton and Beau Arnold both just an elbow away. Juarez clocked in at 24.50, with Dalton at 24.85 and Arnold at 28.70 in one of the tightest races of the day. Dalton later won the 100 breaststroke over Orange Park's Princeton Williams, while Clay's Alex Sgro finished in third place.
In the 100 free, won by Pedro Menendez's Ethan Watson in 53.60, Orange Park earned a second-place finish with Dalton Blake in 55.23 and a fourth-place finish from Jabin Buckman in 57.02, as Raiders coach Susan Johnson reloaded her formidable sprint team, led by Sergio Lopez last year.
Orange Park won matches 154-112 against Menendez and 145-109 against Clay.
The Clay girls won matches of 135-112 over Menendez and 147-78 over Orange Park.
Clay's girls got double wins from Taylor Hildum in the 50 and 100 freestyles and Kylie Elrod in the 200 individual medley and the 100 breaststroke. Haley Hajost won the 100 backstroke.
Clay High sophomore Noah Stotler had impressive times in the 200 free in 1:44.27 by almost 11 seconds and 52.44 in the 100 butterfly, with Suarez second in 56.73.
Orange Park boys got wins also in the 500 free by freshman Abraham Yeykal in 6:03.89, Dakota Blake in the 100 back, with teammate Nicholas Santana second after Santana won the 200 IM.