It's beginning to look a lot like ????

Wednesday October 29th and our first measurable snowfall of the season was there to greet the boys on their way to the pool this morning. Here is a little video of the current weather here in lovely Western New York. Our Texan, Francisco Nieves is out making snow angels. Enjoy the video.

Pitt Follow-up

We traveled down for a dual meet with Pitt on Friday afternoon visiting Pittsburgh's newly renovated Trees Pool and had another solid performance on the road winning 5 events and more importantly posting a bunch of season and lifetime bests for many of the team. Some of the highlights for me were our very solid 200 Medley Relay time of 1:35.93 (Koenig, Michalik, Kundzik, Henahan). Kevin Murphy in the 1000 collected the victory and posted a lifetime best in the event with a 9:47.27, Chris Baker continues to show his ability to improve in the 200 dropping some more time for a strong 1:45.20, while Jared Robinson, Mike Dansa and Clayton Coleman all posted non-championsip lifetime bests in the 200. The swimmer of the meet for the Bonnies had to be Mariusz Michalik who won two events (200 breast 2:07.10 and 400 IM 4:09.45), Oosh has been putting in great effort so far this year and really looks to be a force to go deep into the 3:50's in the 4 IM! Sophomore David Kundzik collected a first in the 100 fly with a time of 51.39. Our final victory of the day came in the 200 Free Relay with Henahan, Kundzik, Murphy and Baker touching first with a decent time of 1:26.15. The top story for me continues to be the improvement from meet to meet in our times and the vast number of personal bests that have been attained with the work that we have been doing. There are a few area's that I feel we have underachieved in to this point and some additional focus will be placed there to get them to where they need to be!

Here is the link to the results: http://gobonnies.cstv.com/sports/m-swim/stats/2008-2009/results_for_st_bonaventure_at_pitt_10-24-08.html

Next up is Cleveland State on Saturday at 1:00 in the Reilly Center Pool.

Dry Land

Here is recent video of a dry land on Thursday morning that we did. Some medball stuff, plyo box agility training, and some other exercises. This is all after an hour in the weight room with our strength and conditioning coach from 5:45 -7:00 and the dryland portion runs from 7:00-7:45am.

Alumni Sets

Alright Bona swimmers of old, here is your chance to crank up those memory banks and regurgitate that favorite, or not so favorite, set of yours. I often hear stories of the different fabled sets that one coach or another made you do and now is your chance to offer it up. Why, you say? So I can use it on our current victims. I am always looking for new twists and excuses to justify ridiculous sets that I create. Forward them on and I am sure this will get some interesting dialogue going.

Here is a recent one to get the juices flowing:

10 x 500

odds whole decending at 6:00
#2 1 x 100 @ 1:10/4 x 100 @ 1:15
#4 2 x 100 @ 1:08/3 x 100 @ 1:20
#6 3 x 100 @ 1:06/2 x 100 @ 1:25
#8 4 x 100 @ 1:05/1 x 100 @ 2:00
#10 5 x 100 @ 1:15 Best average

Pitt Meet

This Friday we will be traveling to Pittsburgh for a dual meet with PITT. Diving will complete one board at 3:00 then swimming will begin at 4:00. The format is a 16 Event format and here is the order of events.

200 Med Relay
1000 Free
200 Free
100 Back
100 Breast
200 Fly
50 free
Diving Break
100 Free
200 Back
200 Breast
500 Free
100 Fly
Diving Break
400 IM
200 Free Relay

Each swimmer is permitted 4 events with no more than 3 of them individual. We will be leaving campus at 11:00am.

Shippensburg Meet

Sunday's dual meet against Shippensburg provided us the opportunity to see some alternate event swims for the team. There were a few specific events that had entries for a reason but many entries were to see what type of versatility we have in the group. The highlight of the meet was Chris Baker's 200 free performance of 1:45.61 which is very solid for this point of the season. Mike Dansa continues to impress with a lifetime best 10:07.79 in the 1000. Freshmen captured victories in the 1000 Mike Dansa, 200 IM Peter Koenig, 100 free Clayton Coleman and 100 back Jake Greene. Seniors Chris Happel and Pat Henahan posted solid times in the 100 fly going 1-2 with 52.66 & 52.67 respectively. Also sophomore David Kundzik criused to a victory in the 500 free with a time of 4:51.79 and Kevin Murphy showed he is still a force in the breaststroke winning the 100 with a time of 1:00.40. Having two Medley relays under 1:39 was a nice show of some depth at this point but there is plenty of work to do and holes to fill.

Here is the link to the results: http://gobonnies.cstv.com/sports/m-swim/stats/2008-2009/shippensburg10-19.html

Next up we travel back down to Pittsburgh Friday for a dual meet with Pitt!!! Diving begins at 3:00 and swimming begins at 4:00.

Duquesne Meet

A solid team effort and some timely touch-outs resulted in a nice 116-89 win over a solid Duquesne team on Saturday. Despite no diving and losing the opening 400 Medley Relay the men rebounded with a solid all around effort. The 200 strokes were strong with the back halves looking as solid as I had hoped to see them. Our sprinting is not up to speed yet but that is the plan at this point. Freshmen played a big role in this with many having very solid kick-offs to the competitive season, in particular Mike Dansa (200 free, 500 free, 200 breast), Yi Liu (200 IM, 200 fly) and Jake Greene (200 free, 200 back). Kevin Murphy came up huge with very solid performances in winning two individual events (1000 & 500 free) as well as Mariusz Michalik (200 IM & 200 breast).

Here is a link to the results: http://gobonnies.cstv.com/sports/m-swim/stats/2008-2009/swim-sbu.html

Today we have Shippensburg at 12:00 and will be doing a short format of 200 relays and 100's in the strokes. Results will follow.

Seeking Gala Donations

The Annual Tip-off Gala is taking place November 8th and this year is honoring Men's Basketball's 1960-61 NCAA Tournament Team. We are in need of auction items for this event. Proceeds from the funds gained are directly deposited into the Men's Swimming Booster account. If you have any questions or interest in donating something please feel free to contact me at your earliest convenience.

WNY Invite

The first racing of the young season was had last Saturday in Buffalo at the Western New York Invite. With UB, Binghamton, Canisius, Niagara and SBU in attendance this unscored event served as a reason to do some racing. Sluggish results from a tough week were the by-product. Highlights would be limited but expected with David Kundzik (100 free 47.37) and Mariusz Michalik (200 breast 2:12.44).

Here is the link to the entire meet results: http://gobonnies.cstv.com/sports/w-swim/stats/2008-2009/wnyresults.html

Western New York Invite

The Western New York Invite will serve as our first opportunity to fire up the engines to see what we have to work with this season. This unscored event that will be hosted by the Univ. at Buffalo will take place on October 11th. Sessions are at 10:00am and 4:00pm with a timed finals format.

Session 1 (10:00am)

200 Medley Relay

500 Free

200IM

50 Free

200 Fly

100 Breast

200 Back

1 Meter Dive

Session 2 (4:00pm)

100 Free

1000 Free

100 Back

100 Fly

200 Breast

200 Free

400 IM

200 Free Relay

3 Meter Dive

Each individual will be swimming 4 Individual Events so start looking at your potential events.

Humphrey Hill Challenge 08

The Humphrey Hill Run was waged this morning in a brisk 38 degrees. The fog was thick as Kevin Murphy emerged victorious with the last 1/4 mile being done in bright sunshine above the cloud layer. The Team Challenge results were tabulated and Liquid Grunt came out victorious with an average time of 15:37.64 to The Frederson's 16:35.6.

Here are the results:

Kevin Murphy 12:26
Dan Quirk 12:43
Jake Greene 13:40
Ilya Nenashev 14:02
David Kundzik 14:21
Brady Bradshaw 14:23
Hunter Baskerville 15:14
Yi Liu 15:19
Mariusz Michalik 15:34
Chris Baker 15:37
Jared Robinson 15:40
Mike Dansa 16:00
Chris Happel 16:19
Peter Koenig 16:32
Clayton Coleman 17:00
Ryan Quinn 17:10
Dan Eisemann 17:17
Francisco Nieves 17:54
Phil Smith 21:19
Rob Erickson 22:19

Humphrey Hill Run

The Annual Humphrey Hill ascent will take place this Saturday morning, continuing a long tradition of this event. Begun many years ago due to the fact that we had a bunch of freshmen that refused to race each other in practice, this has turned into a staple each year. It is a 1 1/2 mile hill about 5 miles outside of town. Last years Champ, Dan Quirk finished in a time of 12:40, just off of his personal best of 12:16.
Results and video will follow the completion.