By Jacob Norling
February 8, 2023
 
(MONTEREY PARK, Calif.) Westmont Women's Swimming opened up day one of the four-day Pacific Collegiate Swim Conference Championships on Wednesday, when the Warriors dove in at East Los Angeles College. Westmont wasted no time making their mark, with several Warriors collecting both lifetime and program-best times.
 
Westmont's day started with the 1000 yard freestyle, which featured both Jackie Kortenhoeven and Lauren Healy. Kortenhoeven led off for the Warriors in the race's first heat, posting a time of 13:23.32, which was nearly 15 seconds faster than her previous season-best.
 
"I definitely feel like I've improved my body position in the water," said Kortenhoeven. "I also improved on the pull of my stroke. Jill has given us really killer distance sets, and has really made us focus on our pace. Jill has always stressed mentality as well, and our mentality exercises have really helped me."
 
Healy showed much of the same success, finishing the event in 11:19.34, which was a lifetime-best mark. In Healy's case, the freshman trimmed a remarkable 27.39 seconds off of her previous best mark.
 
"Over the last few months, Jill has really upped the training," offered Healy. "She's pushed me in ways I really didn't expect to be pushed. It's been hard, but it's been really key for my growth. It's hard to stay mentally engaged during that long of a race, but practice makes perfect, and I've been swimming a lot of really long distance races."
 
In the evening Westmont began competition in the relays with the Warriors making school history in the 200 yard medley relay. Ella Chaisson, Rian Lewandowski, Bailey Lemmon, and Emma Diehl combined to post a time of 1:48.74, which set a new program record. Westmont's previous best time in the 200 medley relay was 1:52.85.
 
The Warriors also posted the eighth-best 200 medley relay time of the meet.
 
"This was really exciting," reflected Lemmon, a senior. "I haven't competed in this pool since my freshman year. It was really exciting to finally get back here and not only compete, but break a program record with this group of women.
 
"We were telling each other we were going to do it leading up to the race, and to actually go out and do it made it really exciting."
 
Not only did the relay team make collective history, but Chaisson's 50 yard backstroke in the first leg of the race was clocked at 27.22, which set a new program record. Chaisson broke the record previously held by Ellie Muench, a time of 27.65 which was coincidentally set during the conference championships a year ago.
 
"I'm excited and pretty pumped to be here with these amazing ladies," said a joyful Chaisson. "For the rest of the week I'm hoping to see more time drops all across the board, and hopefully we'll break even more school records in the relays."
 
Also competing in the 200 yard medley relay were McKenzie Rion, Abigail Rickard, Daisy Marquardt, and Leighton Bell. Together, the freshmen posted a time of 1:55.32, which was nearly six seconds better than their entry mark.
 
The Warriors continued making history in the 800 yard freestyle relay, when Olivia Garrison, Emma Bustamante, Chaisson, and Morgan Bienias finished the race in 7:52.84. The group's finish broke Westmont's previous record of 7:56.44, which was set in November of 2021.
 
Garrison's leg of the race was clocked at 1:56.06, which also set a new program record. Garrison's 1:56.06 broke Bienias' previous record of 1:56.29, which was set a year ago at the conference championships.
 
Also competing in the 800 yard freestyle relay was Marquardt, Rion, Healy, and Bell. Together the quartet posted a time of 8:05.78, which was over a second faster than their entry mark.
 
Closing out the night for the Warriors was Lewandowski who competed in the time trials of the 100 yard breaststroke. Closing out the day in style, the senior completed the race in a lifetime-best 1:09.19.
 
"Day one was really great," said Westmont head coach Jill Jones Lin. "I'm really excited about the 500 tomorrow, we have a ton of people in the 500. The 50s will be really exciting, and we have a couple people in the 200 IM as well, so tomorrow should be another exciting day."
 
The Warriors return to action at 9:30 a.m. on Thursday, when six Westmont swimmers will kick off the day in the 500 yard freestyle. Westmont's full schedule and entry list is available on the Westmont Athletics website.