Riverside & Orange Coast Lead the Way Following Day One of OEC Swim Championships

The first day of the 2019 Orange Empire Conference swimming championships is in the books with the Riverside City College men and the Orange Coast College women leading their respective categories.

Riverside won four out of the five swim races on the first day and added solid depth in scoring 320.5 points.  The Tigers claimed both the 200-yard freestyle relay and the 400-yard medley relay while Erick Fathoni set a new conference record in winning the 200-yard individual medley (1:50.11) and Zack Thelwell captured the 50-yard freestyle (21.12 seconds).  The only event that Riverside didn't claim was the 500-yard freestyle which was captured by Golden West College's Travis Spaan (4:51.79), but Riverside had five swimmers qualify for the championship finals in that race.

Golden West currently sits in second place in the team standings with 201 points while Orange Coast (130) and Saddleback (103) have some space to make up.

In the women's competition, Orange Coast has a 267-218 edge over Riverside with Golden West (130) and Cypress (109) giving chase.  Like the Riverside men's team, Orange Coast's women's team captured both relay events.  The Pirates captured the 200-yard freestyle relay in 1:39.79 and the 400-yard medley relay in 4:03.61.  The Pirates also captured all three swim races with Amber Theders winning the 500-yard freestyle (5:13.98), Cheyenne Morris took the 200-yard individual medley (2:10.98), and Meghan Kluck claimed the 50-yard freestyle (23.45 seconds).

The OEC swimming championships continue on Friday at Saddleback College.  Preliminary heats will start at 9:30 a.m. with the championship finals scheduled to begin at 3:30 p.m.  All meet results are posted live at https://www.swimphone.com/meets/meet_menu.cfm?smid=11368

Day 1 results HERE