This past weekend the boys swim and dive team competed in its first meet of the season. The 75th Cereal Bowl Relay in Battle Creek is a huge meet to prove where their team starts this season as they compete against sixteen other teams.

Freshman Ian Tyrrell, sophomores Sam Grant, and Zach Ruffer, and junior Jayden Doyel started the meet for FHC in the 200-yard breast relay. They earned tenth place with a final time of 2:28.05. Although it wasn’t the start the team was hoping for, they had gotten in the grove of things by their third event. Freshman Lucas Witham and seniors Gavin Cai, Ben Rogala, and Isaac Stewart were able to secure first place in the 400-yard free relay with a time of 3:27.56, beating out the second-place finishers by over seven seconds.

“It felt great to win that race, going into it I didn’t expect to win,” Ben said. “I’m very proud of Lucas the freshman on that relay, he did a great job stepping up to the plate.”

The boys continued to stay strong throughout the rest of their meet. The 400-yard individual medley relay team consisted of freshmen Ian Tyrrell, and Lucas Witham, junior Dylan Pomeroy, and Isaac Stewart. These four boys were able to take third place with a time of 4:21.46. Soon after that Dylan Pomeroy, Zach Ruffer, Lucas Witham, and Isaac Stewart were able to snag second place in the 200-yard back relay with a time of 1:54.73.

“Overall we all had a really good meet and a strong start to the season,” Isaac said. “We had lots of fast times that we can improve upon as we get ready for our dual meets.”

During the seventh event, Dylan Pomeroy, Zach Ruffer, Lucas Witham, and Isaac Stewart all came out again to compete in the 200-yard back relay where they placed second with a time of 1:58.22. Lastly, to finish out the meet, sophomores Logan Tiggleman and Nolan Breckon, along with seniors Gavin Cai and Ben Rogala took on the 200-yard medley relay. With all of their hard work put into the race, they were able to take first place with a time of 1:47.71 only beating out the second-place finishers by 0.14 seconds.

“In my opinion, the meet went well, I was very happy with the enthusiasm of everyone on the team,” Ben said. “We did a great job cheering each other on, I would like to see some better relay exchanges though. I understand that those take time, we’ll just have to keep working at it.”

Overall the team took third place out of seventeen schools, earning 262 points. After this strong start to their season, the team looks forward to keeping the momentum going as they head into their next meet which will be the East Kentwood quad on December 6, at 5:00 pm, at East Kentwood High School.