On Aug. 1-4, Marina Olmstead, 17, of Chunky, competed in the Florida International Championships. Normally following the state championships, swimmers that qualify go to a national meet known as Zones. But the international meet had more difficult qualifying times than Zones, bringing in faster kids from all over the country. Only a few girls from Mississippi have ever qualified to go to this meet.
The meet was held in Clearwater, Fla., and indeed the competition was stiff with college and top high school swimmers from around the country, including Florida State University. It is very rare for a female swimmer from Mississippi to make the A finals. Marina managed to do this multiple times. By meet’s end, Marina medaled 5 times (50m Free, 50m Back, 50 m Fly, 100m Breast, and 100m Fly). Even though Marina will be just entering her senior year, most of the swimmers at the meet thought she was already in college.
The focus of this meet was about swimming against good college swimmers, to better prepare Marina for college swimming a year from now. Moving forward from here, she will focus this short course season on improving times that will give her better college placement.
Sister Maya Olmstead, 14, had an outstanding end to her long course season with 2 medals at the Mississippi Long Course State Championships held July 19-22, at Delta State. She placed 4th in the 400m Free and 5th in the 200m Free, jumping ten places from where she was seeded.
