Sobrato’s Jarod Hatch officially concluded his high school swim career with two Top 3 swims at the CIF State Swim Championships on May 20 in Clovis.
For the third straight year, Hatch swam in the 200-yard free and for the second straight year, improved his time from the previous season.
Once again, Hatch went up against some tough competition in both races, but did enact a little revenge in the 100y butterfly.
Hatch took third in 1:36.87, finishing 2 seconds off of first and second, who both shattered the record set the previous year.
Alexei Sancov of Northgate (Walnut Creek) swam a 1:34.25 to win the event with Bryce Mefford of Oak Ridge High School (El Dorado Hills) just 0.57 seconds behind him at 1:34.82.
By comparison, Hatch was 0.22 seconds off the previous record of 1:36.65, set last year by Palo Alto’s Alex Liang.
The California State Swim Championships began in 2015.
This was the second year in a row Hatch finished third in the event behind two swimmers vying for state meet records.
In a change up from the last two times Hatch has competed on the state level, he did not swim in the 500y free, instead opting for the 100y butterfly, which he narrowly took second at CCS earlier this month.
In the 100y fly, Hatch shaved more than a second off of his preliminary time of 48.55, finishing in 47.42.
He was edged out by Mefford who swam a 46.85, just 0.10 seconds off of the state meet record set two years ago.
Hatch, meanwhile, was in a tight race for second, with Nos. 2-4 all finishing less than a second apart.
Hatch edged out University City’s Brendan Santa by 0.15 seconds and Harker School’s Ethan Hu—who had beaten Hatch for a CCS title—by 0.44 seconds.
Hatch will now be working through the summer as he gets ready to head to Berkeley starting in the fall where he will be swimming next season.
