Katonah Swim & Dive Wins the Big Trophy!

Bedford Village, Bedford Hills, Seven Bridges and Pleasantville Swim & Dive Teams came to the Katonah Pool for the highlight event of the summer season – the Katonah Invitational. Katonah battled these teams for the impressive four-foot 1^st place trophy, and bragging rights to relays, crazy dives and strokes, parent relay, lifeguard relay and the staff relay.

Starting with Synchronized Diving, Brookie Edgar and Maria Abrams of Bedford Village posted the highest scores with two 6.5s and a 10 in beautiful mirror images of each other. In the Big Splash contest, out of 17 contestants Katonah’s Noah Leiboff took first with a score of 9-9-9, David Zamara of Bedford Hills and George Khandji of Seven Bridges took 2^nd and 3^rd with impressive splashes to the delight of the crowd and the lifeguard at the side of the dive pool. 

The Most Entertaining Dive proved to be one of the most creative dive events. Katonah’s Coach Kate Hallex declared this as her favorite event. “Sign up was this morning before the meet and we had two big lists overall. This event was a big sell to the kids! No coaching, just what the kids thought was entertaining.” Katonah’s Colin Keating, 8, put together a dive that not only earned him cheers from all of the teams, it earned him the only three perfect 10s of the day and 1^st place!

Probably the most entertaining swim event was the Crazy Relay. Each swimmer in the relay was a different age group and had to do a different stroke:  6 & under kickboard, 8 & under doggie paddle (barking optional), 10 & under sidestroke, 12 & under corkscrew (one stroke free/one stroke back so you are actually rolling over!), 14 & one-arm fly (isn’t two-arm hard enough?), 18 & under Hawaiian breaststroke (feet first on your back).

In the last lap of the girls Hawaiian breaststroke, Pleasantville’s Rebecca Lord had almost one full length lead against 2^nd place Anne Baudinet from Katonah when it happened … they began to laugh. And sink! While Baudinet started to catch up, out of their line of vision was Bedford Village’s Maria Abrams flying with pointed toes determined to win and Katonah’s Katie Liebowitz along side of her. With shouts from poolside, Baudinet recovered to take 1^st with Lord 2^nd.

In the boys Crazy Relay, entertaining was again the operative word when Katonah’s Pat Kelly began to sink (no, it’s not as easy as it seems…!) and had to get towed to the finish by NWSC official Paul McClintock amid laughter and cheers from the crowd.

At the end of the morning’s events, Katonah was thrilled to win the Invitational trophy. Bedford Hills took home the big 2^nd place trophy for their showcase, and Pleasantville the 3^rd place trophy.  Seven Bridges was 4^th and Bedford Hills was 5th.