Swim Team Completes First Meet of the Season

The first swim meet of the 2025 swim season is in the books. The Larry Baratte Preview Meet this past Saturday, Feb 8th at the Ventura Aquatic Center was an excellent start to our swim season. This year Pierce College has one of the largest men's teams we have had in many years. We have 14 men on the swimming roster and are expecting exciting results. The first swim meet of the yea rwas a practice swim meet with 19 swim teams competing. The purpose of this first swim meet is to watch all of the Western State Conference swimmers compete for the first time. The goal at the end of the season is to qualify for the finals (1st-8th) or the consolation finals (9th-16th) in each event. Each swimmer in the WSC Championships is allowed to swim 3 individual events, and 4 relays. This was a tremendous test to find out who is in the top 16 of each event at the beginning of the year. 

Our fastest swimmer is freshman Jhan Loninia from Faith Baptist High School. Jhan has a tremendous work ethic and has been swimming and competing for a long time. Jhan is a coach's dream because of his diversity and the ability to swim in almost any event and do well. Jhan won the 200 IM in a 2:02.95, was second in the 500 free in a 4:52.58, and third in the 200 free in a 1:47.56. Freshman Matteo Podesta from Granada Hills Charter High School also finished in the top 16 in his events. Matteo swam the 500 free in a 5:36.23 qualifying 10th, and the 200 free in a 2:01.02 qualifying 14th. Finally, returning swimmer Nikita Zlobin a sophomore, finished 16th in the 100 breaststroke, finishing in a 1:19.42 and scoring points for our team.  

Our Los Angeles Pierce College women's swim team has seven swimmers this year. We are looking for one more female so that we can have an A and B relay team and promote competition amongst the women in workout. Sophomore Melina Farabolini our captain from last year, scored the highest number of points in the 100-fly, finishing 5th in a 1:21.90. She was 11th in both the 100 back and 200 IM. Her last race was the 100 breaststroke in which she placed 14th in a 1:28.79. Melina is also very well rounded, which allows the coaches the flexibility to move her around where needed. Freshman Baran Ebrahimi comes to us from Louisville High School and in her first year qualified in the top 16 in each race she swam. Her best race was the 100 freestyle where she placed 12th in a 1:02.29. She placed 13th in the100 breaststroke in a 1:27.75, 14th in the 200 freestyle in a 2:23.12, and 16th in the 50 free in a 28.70. There were over 40 swimmers in the 50 free and 35 in the 100 freestyle which makes the 100 and 200 breaststroke excellent events for Baran to consider in upcoming swim meets. She has the potential to qualify in any freestyle or breaststroke event this year. Finally, freshman Natalie Reyes from Granada Hills Charter High School qualified 15th in the 100 backstroke for us. Due to the wildfires and other circumstances Natalie has only been able to train for a few days and so we are looking forward to what she can accomplish with a little more time both in the pool and also in the weight room. She has a tremendous amount of natural talent which is exciting.

Overall, the coaches were very impressed with both the men's and women's performance in our first swim meet of 2025. The student-athletes trained extremely hard for this competition, and we had no disqualifications or missed events. Our swimmers have been using the small pool at Pierce College after being off campus for the last two years. The Pierce College swimmers are in the water at 8am Monday through Friday on the Pierce College campus if you would like to come by and see the team train. If there are any swimmers who have a background in high school or club swimming and want to join us, please come by workout sometime this week and we can talk. We are proud of our Brahmas and look forward to our next competition at Valley College on February 21st at 11:00am. We hope to see you there.