PHILADELPHIA – The North Penn boys swim team captured the District 1 title at LaSalle University this weekend. With a score of 302.5 points, the team came together with tremendous individual and relay races all around. Competing head to head for first, freshman Sean Faikish and junior Aidan Daly had fantastic races, both breaking the school record in the 500 yard Freestyle, with 1st and 2nd place being separated by .01 of a second.

“My close race with Sean was a blast. There were actually three people neck and neck the whole race (Sean, Emils Jurcick, and I), and I was so happy to go 1,2 in that event. Sean and I have been training side by side since we were five so to share the podium with him was great. We also scored a lot of points in this event in particular, and that helped us secure the district championship in the end. We also both went our best times [4:33.59 (Faikish), 4:33.60 (Daly)] and both broke the school record. Overall I couldn’t be happier with that race,” said Daly.

Both Faikish and Daly contributed greatly to the freestyle relay which placed 2nd. In addition, Daly was part of the 2nd place 200 yard Freestyle Relay (1:26.12), and individually, he placed 2nd in the 200 yard freestyle (1:41.56). Faikish individually placed 2nd in the 200 IM with a time of 1:50.91 and was also part of the winning 200 yard Medley relay (1:34.19).

“I give credit to all of our coaches for putting us in the best position to win. They’ve trained us hard all year and it showed in those events that if you work for it, anything is possible. This team really came together and all of our hard work payed off. For the relays, we told each other we had each others’ backs, and we wanted to win it for North Penn,” said Faikish.

Along with Faikish and Daly, two key scorers of the meet and contributors to scoring relays were sophomore Ryley Fein and junior Noah Jamieson. Fein was in both the 200 yard Freestyle Relay and the 200 yard Medley Relay. He individually placed 3rd in the 200 yard Freestyle (1:42.43) and placed 5th in the 100 yard Breaststroke (58.93). Jamieson swam in all 3 of the relays and individually placed 2nd in the 100 yard Fly (50.33).

“Winning any title feels great, whether it be individually or as a team. I don’t really think anyone was too concerned with beating another team or inching ahead of someone else. Really I think it’s just my teammates’ drive to be the best they can possibly be, and their sense that everyone’s in it together that earned us enough points for a win. This one felt particularly great though because we did it as a team. For me personally, it was especially rewarding because this was my first real big event as part of this team. I’m somewhat of a ‘transplant’ to this team you might say, but everyone celebrated with me as if I’d always been on the team,” said Jamieson.

Many of the members of the team agree that being a team was the most important part of their success. Another key swimmer who contributed to the team’s results was junior Nathan Hartmann. Hartmann swam in the winning 200 yard Medley Relay and the 400 Freestyle Relay. Also, he individually placed 7th in the 200 yard IM (1:55.65) and 8th in the 100 yard Backstroke.

“Everyone came together tremendously for the individual and relay events. We only won three events but ended up winning the whole meet because of the team depth and chemistry. Going into states there are lots of improvements to be made across the board, not only in my events, but in other people’s events too. This puts us in a great position heading into states. Hopefully we can also use the momentum from our district championship to push us through the states meet,” said Daly.