Hello Lake Marion Family! It was great to see everyone who attended our banquet and awards celebration last night. I can’t promise that this is the last email you will receive this summer, but I can promise that it will be the last long one! ;)

Here’s what’s included:

• Divisionals & All Stars Representation
• Popsicle Meet
• Banquet & Awards Night
• Thank Yous
• Raft & Splash Reminders
• End of Season Survey

Divisionals

We received a lot of compliments from the other teams in the division about our Divisionals meet on Saturday morning. Thank you to everyone who played a role in making the day such a success - from all of the volunteers to the coaches, and of course the swimmers. There were a lot of personal best ribbons handed out that day, despite the sweltering heat!

Congratulations to the Shuttles Family for winning the family spirit award, as well as Brett Page and Catherine Silva for their spirit awards for cheering on our team that morning.

The following swimmers achieved All Star times on Saturday:

• Sam Arias - IM, Free, Breast & Fly
• Kyla Clagett - Free and Fly
• Eli Hunter - Fly
• Chase Keeler - IM, Free, Back and Fly
• Alice Kuminov - Fly
• Austin Seager - Breast

Congratulations to Sam Arias, who broke a ton of team records! She now holds the team record in 13-14 girls IM, Free, Breast and Fly! Sam will also be at the All Star Meet on Sunday swimming breastroke. We are cheering for you Sam!

Popsicle Meet

We met again on deck on Sunday morning to cheer on our littlest Lasers! Congratulations to all of the preteamers who participated. We are so proud of you! Thank you to all of the CITs who came out to help, Nelson Hunter for being our official, Tanya Hunter for being our ribbon writer, the coaches who supported the swimmers all year, and Nicole Goldsby for organizing the morning fun!

Banquet & Awards Night

It was so great to see the team in their Sunday best yesterday evening to celebrate the season. There are so many thank yous and congratulations to share!

First off, thank you to the coaches for all of the time, energy and thought they put into each of the swimmers’ paper plate awards. Wow! I was blown away listening to what they shared about each swimmer, and their artwork (and their helpers’ artwork) was amazing!

A huge shout out to Karrie Shuttles for coordinating such an amazing evening! Chuck Shuttles created an amazing senior slideshow that brought many of us to tears. And the Phelan Family, and Simply Fresh, catered a tasty and delicious meal for us.

We will miss our graduating seniors! Thank you Maya Barrett, Ben Caldwell, Daphne Giffin, Jack Mikula, Rachel Sharp, and Tyler Shuttles for being amazing leaders. We wish you all the best in your future endeavors and hope to see you visiting the pool deck next summer!

Congratulations to the following swimmers for earning the following awards:

• Most Improved - Peter Perry & Maddie Arias
• Perseverance - Cameron Clagett & Diana Golub
• Spirit - Jack Mikula & Sophia Paez
• Sportsmanship - Ricky Najarro & Julia Lewis
• Coach’s - Eli Hunter & Sarah Caldwell
• Excellence - Chase Keeler & Sam Arias

Preteam

• Perseverance - Izzy Murray-Cabrera
• Most Improved - Bryce Torres
• Sportsmanship - Matthew Beltran
• Spirit - Grayson Goldsby
• Courageous - Alyssa Shombert

Apologies to Camila Benicio who was in attendance last night but did not receive her paper plate award and Mason Manguiri who did not receive his preteam trophy. We will have their awards, and the awards of everyone else we may have inadvertently missed or not in attendance last night, at Raft and Splash - if the weather holds. We also hope to have the team picture orders at that time!

Thank you to all of the volunteers who helped last night with set up, serving, clean up and preparations. And a huge shout out to Mike Page for being our fabulous master of ceremonies last evening!

More Thank Yous

Thank you to our fabulous coaches - Head Coach Jorge Silva, Assistant Coaches Ava Silva and Nick Keeler, and Swimmer Coaches Maya Barrett and Jack Mikula. We are lucky to have such an amazing coaching team at Lake Marion!

Our team couldn't function without the time and efforts of so many volunteers. Thank you to everyone who volunteered this season. From setup and take down, to concessions, to automation, to awards, to timing and all of the other behind the scenes work - we could not have had such a great season without all of you!

We would like to shout out some volunteers who have gone above and beyond this season.

• Chuck Shuttles - for being our officials coordinator, sound system guru, parking coordinator extraordinaire, and so much more!
• Tung Nguyen - for working behind the hot grill at all of our home meets, including in the blistering heat on Saturday for hours and hours!
• The Giffin Family - for cooling down our swimmers and spectators with snow cones at all of our home meets!
• The Nelson Family - for volunteering at every single meet this season, working on awards, officiating, setting up, breaking down, timing and more!
• Brenda & Frank Akstulewicz, and Katie Paez - for our “talk of the town” hospitality for timers and officials at all of our home meets!
• Irma Najarro - for being our awards chair and coordinating our teen and senior gifts!
• The Phelan Family - for taking the lead on concessions this season and catering our fabulous banquet!

And finally, thank you to Mekeba Barrett for her years of service to the Lake Marion Lasers. As I said last night, she has served on the swim committee all of the years Maya has been on the team - from B Rep to A Rep, as well as the keeper of all Lake Marion and summer swim knowledge. We can’t thank her enough for all of the hours and love you have poured into the team since 2012. Congratulations on receiving the Kristine Frohman Service Award!

Raft and Splash

The weather does not look promising for this evening’s Raft and Splash event at Lake Marion, but we are holding out hope that we can all enjoy some fun at Lake Marion this evening from 5-8 PM. Check your email closer to the start time with any weather updates! If we are rained out this evening, we will try again on Thursday, July 28th.

As a reminder, Raft & Splash is for registered Lake Marion Laser families and coaches only - no additional guests please. In order for non-registered family members of swim team families to participate in raft and splash, we will need parents to print, sign, and bring to the event this waiver form for each non-registered family member. Without a signed waiver form, the non-registered family member will not be able to participate.

End of Season Survey and Feedback

Thank you for reading to the end of this email! It has been a fabulous season and we look forward to next year. Please be on the lookout for our end of season survey that Chuck Shuttles will send to you in the near future. And please feel free to share any feedback you have about the season with any committee member so we can continue to grow next year!

Thanks for a fabulous season!

Daria