By Dan Karpiel

The Surveyor

As a general rule, teams new to competition experience a fair number of ups and downs as they go through the adjustment period. That is not the case for the Berthoud High School (BHS) girls swimming team.

Competing at the large Mountain View Invitational on Saturday in Loveland, the Berthoud girls took fourth place with a team score of 207, behind only Cherry Creek (514), Silver Creek (482) and Niwot (212) in the 13-team field that had over 350 young women competing. Saturday’s impressive results were just the most recent in a long line of what has been a strong start for Berthoud’s first season in the pool.

The success the team has enjoyed through the first month of the season has even surprised Berthoud Head Coach Matthew Goldsmith. “As a new team, and as a new coach in Colorado high school swimming, everything is a little bit of a surprise. From our swimming knowledge base to our success, nothing has been anticipated or expected,” Goldsmith said.

Berthoud’s coach continued, “Our growth, and there’s been a lot, has been focused almost solely on creating relationships with one another and developing team expectations in academics, work ethic, and attitude. Our growth is mostly due to an emphasis on taking advantage of opportunities given. Now that this foundation is laid, we have started focusing on what we can accomplish as a team at conference and state. We are hoping for a few more surprises.”

At the Mountain View Invite, Berthoud saw nine top-10 finishes in the meet’s 12 events, some of which had close to 200 swimmers competing. Goldsmith chalks up the team’s success to the dedication the girls have made, saying, “I think the dedication these athletes have had in improving themselves and each other has been paramount to the success of our team. They’re attentive and ask questions about technique and race strategies when they don’t understand. The girls are advocates for themselves and communicate well with their coaches.”

Berthoud’s Jamie Dellwardt has been spectacular through the first six events of the season and Saturday was no different. The sophomore took first place in the 100-yard backstroke, with a time of 1:06.60 and finished runner-up in the 500-yard freestyle, turning in a mark of 5:28.89, Both times are state-qualifying marks. Yet Dellwardt was not done there as she also competed with teammates Arika Beard, Sarah McCormick and Kysa Keck in the 200-yard medley relay where Berthoud’s 2:05.28 was good enough for a fifth-place finish and in the 400-yard freestyle relay with Keck, Hannah Roberts and Abby Dodd where Berthoud took fourth place (4:02.85).

“Jamie has a focus I have only seen in a handful athletes. She is very goal oriented and she doesn’t let any noise distract her. It’s always Jamie vs. Jamie first, and then the competition. I think that is extremely important for success in the sport of swimming,” Goldsmith said of his star sophomore. “Day in and day out, if you challenge yourself and push through thresholds during workouts, then you will have a stronger performance during competition. That is Jamie. I have yet to see her take a stroke during a workout that wasn’t purposeful.”

Berthoud’s 200-yard free relay team of Roberts, Beard, Dodd and Kristina Ball took fifth place with a state-qualifying time of 1:53.09. Beard finished in eighth place in the 100-yard breaststroke (1:20.41), Roberts took 10^th place in the 100-yard butterfly (1:12.81), Ball finished in ninth place in the 500 free with a time of 6:14.83, just ahead of teammate Trinity Payne who took 10^th place (6:30.30).

Berthoud will get back in the pool on Thursday, Jan. 10, when they travel to Gilcrest for a dual with Valley before heading back to Mountain View on Jan. 15 to face off with Skyline.