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January 31, 2010

Adam Krohn: NW swim team's up and going

Northwest Whitfield has a 3-year-old swim program but, under the leadership of coaches Marta Hannah and Belinda Moisen, it’s making significant strides.

The biggest step yet happened at a recent swim meet at the University of Georgia, when the Bruins’ 200-meter freestyle relay team qualified for the Class 4A state meet at Westminster High in Atlanta.

Ryan Ford, Cody Plott, K.J. Norbury and Ben Pipkin combined to swim the relay in 1 minute, 41.38 seconds to give Northwest its first state qualifying swimmers. The qualifying time for the event was 1:41.5.

In 2008, Northwest qualified two divers.

“It’s very big,” Hannah said of the qualifying relay team, “because we want this program to grow. The only way to do that is to show results.”

What makes Northwest’s state appearance so impressive is getting there with limited resources. Unlike Dalton High, which is sending 15 swimmers and four divers to the state meet, Northwest doesn’t have its own pool, meaning it can’t practice on weekday mornings or host meets. The team practices at Dalton State on weekday evenings from 7-8:30 and Saturday from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m.

“Not having a pool makes it very hard,” Hannah said. “We don’t have starting blocks because the pool (at Dalton State) is too shallow at both ends. We have to travel far away to go to swim meets and get experience.”

Hannah recalled the team traveling more than two hours to Douglasville on a school night for a swim meet and not getting home until after 11 p.m. But with Northwest making strides, she’s optimistic the success will translate into funds for a pool of its own.

“Hopefully, in the future we’ll have a pool in Whitfield County that all the schools can use,” Hannah said. “Middle schools, too, because the middle school team has to feed the high school.”

Hannah points to Adairsville High’s pool as an example. The school shares the pool with Bartow County schools Woodland and Cass. Hannah believes that if Whitfield County schools had a pool, it would be possible for Southeast Whitfield and the soon-to-open Coahulla Creek to start swim programs.

“Then we could host our own meets,” Hannah said. “Right now, it’s hard to get parents involved because the meets are so far away. If we hosted meets, they’d be involved because we’d need timers and people to work concessions. Everyone would be working toward the same goal.”

For now, Northwest must take small steps to improve the program, and the next one is the state meet Feb. 12-13.

“We’ve made it this far and I’m proud of that,” Hannah said.

Jake Rogers, an alternate on the 200 freestyle relay team, said he’s pulling for a win at state, but feels the team already has won.

“Our approach about getting there is showing people we can build a swim team from nothing,” Rogers said.

Adam Krohn is a sportswriter for The Daily Citizen. You can write him at adamkrohn@daltoncitizen.com or follow him on Twitter @adamkrohn.

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