Battle for the Paddle is an annual swim meet that Mountain View High School has not won in twenty-three years. It’s been pretty hard to not win for so long, but the team still strives to win one of these years and break the streak. Senior swimmer and Captain Tanner Harmon said, “I’m sad we lost, but they [Orem High] were good sports about winning and we can all still get along.”

This swim meet is always on senior night, so during the second break the swim team was able to celebrate this year’s seniors. It’s always exciting to see the seniors jump into the pool from the diving blocks, and run in between the underclassmen.

Due to Covid-19, spectators were not allowed at the season’s meets, which has been really hard. The past swim meets did not allow spectators, however, the parents of the seniors participating were allowed to watch their child’s last high school swim meet in person. When asking a senior swim parent what they thought of the meet, David Rasmussen said, “It was exciting to see my student swim, because of not being able to watch the other meets.” This was the first and only meet that was allowed to have the parents of the seniors come watch their kids swim. Swim captain Tanner also commented, “It’s been great. I’m glad that we’ve been able to still have swim meets.”

Even though COVID made an unfortunate situation, many of the swimmers had time drops, or swam something entirely new. Jonathan Stott swam the 500 yard freestyle for the first time at the Battle for the Paddle. Junior swimmer Gaby Rubio Florian swam the 100 yard butterfly, and sophomore swimmer Lizeth Trejo Rojo swam the 100 breaststroke as well.

This meet concluded region play. The only swim meet left for the Bruins will be at the state swim meet later this month.