“For the 400 relay, we were all pumped up, we didn’t even know what the score was,” said Winterhalter of breaking the previous mark by exactly four seconds. “[The record] is what we were going for. We were really happy to break that.”
Crescenta Valley’s boys’ squad, which outpaced Arcadia by 101 points on Thursday, had already extended its streak of league titles, shared or outright, to 17 straight years with a win over the Apaches in a Pacific League dual meet on April 29.
The last thing the Falcons wanted to do Thursday, however, was concede a piece of that title back to their fiercest rival.
“Everybody performed very well,” said Falcons boys’ Coach Jan Sakonju, whose team collected titles in six individual events and all three relays, “getting personal-best times, but also moving up in place, higher than they were ranked.
“We knew we had a slight advantage coming in, but the guys always get so up for this competition. They want to do well and they thrive on just working together as a team.”
The Falcons’ girls needed nothing less than first place on Thursday to take a piece of the title for themselves, having lost to Arcadia in the final dual meet of the year.
Behind So’s record-breaking swims, a win in the 400-freestyle relay and a host of second- and third-place finishes, they were more than up to the challenge.
“We knew that it was entirely possible,” Crescenta Valley Coach Robert Miller said. “The hard part with anybody really is that motivation. When you think you’re down, how do you get them to come back?
“They came out and they knew what they had to do.”
