Exceeding Expectations
SWIMATHON
2008
January 20, 2008
Three years ago, nine of the Exceeding Expectations kids swam as many laps as they could in an hour to raise money for the program and to try to win a trip to the 2005 Competitor Magazine Endurance Sports Awards banquet at Sea World in San Diego.
The Exceeding Expectations Swimathon has since become our premier annual fundraising event. What makes it special is that it's the kids themselves who have to step and call friends of the program (who have already offered to participate), introduce themselves, explain what the Swimathon is all about and ask for support in the form of at least a quarter a lap.
This year's event brought in $5,808 from 80 generous and caring contributors. In addition to those great friends of the kids, we had wonderful support from Loma Linda University's Drayson Center, which for the fourth year allowed us free use of their beautiful aquatic facility, and our splendid volunteers.
Here are the winners, based on amount of money raised (a combination of how many laps they swam, the total amount pledged per lap by their sponsors plus lump sum contributions):
1. Carlos Orozco |
2. Josh Rodriguez |
3. Vianey Barrios |
All three are headed for the ESA awards banquet at Sea World in San Diego next month.
In addition, we're taking Stephanie Lujuan, Marlene Samano, Miguel Ibarra and Mikey Arbour, all of whom had won trips to the Challenged Athlete Foundation triathlon which was canceled because of the San Diego fires last November.
We also had special prizes for the most laps swum. Diego Ramirez and Angel Ramirez both won iPod Shuffles. What made that competition especially exciting was that the two cousins were never more than half a lap apart for almost the entire hour, until Angel pulled up with a cramp with less than a minute to go and Diego managed to get one more lap in before time ran out. Deigo's 111 laps and Angel's 110 broke the records previously held by (duh...) Diego, at 103, and Angel at 100. Third prize, a day of skiing with Jacque Irons and her boys, rolled down to Ricardo Orozco when third-place finisher Nik Keller had to decline because of a scheduling conflict.
The thermometer apparently didn't know it was in
California.
Temperature at the start was 340
Pre-race instructions
The clever ones at least got their toes warm
In the water was the warmest place to be, at 810
Veteran EE volunteers Lembit & Tracey Kulbins
A start to rival the Ironman World Championships in Kona!
All under the watchful eye of Drayson Center lifeguard
Jeff Toth
Damien Mieth-Irons heading for the first (flip) turn
Carlos peering through the mist
The coach coaching someone trying to hide under the
starting blocks
Edgar Orozco
Ricardo Orozco
Araceli Zargoza breaking new ground in technique.
(Lee did an entire triathlon like this once.)
Diligent volunteers keeping accurate counts.
Meli Manujano, Miguel & Isi's dad.
Teddy Shavers keeping 'em honest
EE co-founders Jacque & Cherie
Mikey Arbour lapping it up (so to speak)
Nik Keller
The family looks on
Brian Nguyn
Dorian Cole
A lot of drama surrounding Angel, but it was just a bad
cramp
Diego and his great tutor, Naomi Seri
As always, a splendid time was had by all!
Apologies for not having pictures of the post-event party
and letter-writing. (Your humble photographer was busy
calculating the results.)
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