BHS swimmers, divers win league champsionship, undefeated for the season

By Rosemary K. Otzman
Independent Editor
The Belleville High School Varsity boys’ swimmers and divers won the Western Wayne Athletic Conference championship on Feb. 22, going undefeated, 7-0, for the season.
And, they won it in their state-of-the-art, new swimming pool in their new high school.
The BHS Tigers won the championship meet against rivals Dearborn Edsel Ford by a nail-biting score of 488 to 480.
Eight swimmers were named All-League: Jacob Gray, Mikey Hermosillo-DeBoer, Zach Hermosillo-DeBoer, Andrew Lunder, Timo Budiono, Ari Budiono, Brandon Robinson, and Alan Stoelton.
Several of the swimmers placed very well in the meet.
Jacob Gray placed first in the 200 and 500 Freestyle, along with the league records in both of those events. He also qualified for the State meet.
Timo Budiono placed first, as a freshman, in the one-meter diving event and along with Nate Michna and Evan Olds, qualified for the Regional Diving competition Feb. 25.
Mikey Hermosillo-DeBoer placed third in both the 200 and 500 freestyle, while his younger brother Zach placed sixth in the 100 Freestyle and fourth in the 100 Backstroke.
Ari Budiono placed sixth in the 200 IM and then fourth in the 100 Breastroke.
Zach Martin placed sixth in the 500 Freestyle with a time of 5:50.32. He also placed 13th in the 200 IM
Alan Stoelton placed eighth in the 50 free and third in the 100 Free.
Brandon Robinson placed third in the 200 IM and fourth in the 100 Fly.
“I think, however, the most exciting thing that happened at the meet was the last event, the 400 Free relay,” said BHS Swim Coach Aaron Lang.
“Belleville was ahead by two points. Belleville’s relay had to win in order to win the meet. They had the fastest seed time, but Edsel Ford had purposely stacked the last relay, hoping to get the win.
“Belleville was not fazed. In fact, all four of the relay members (Mike DeBoer, Jake Gray, Alan Stoelton, and Brandon Robinson) turned in their personal best to go six seconds faster, win the meet for the team, and earn them a right to participate at the State meet.”
On Monday, Coach Lang explained how the new BHS pool, that is being used this school year for the first time, contributed to the win.
“I would say that the new facility helped in a very big way.
“You’ve got to remember this pool is light years ahead of what we had before. We didn’t even have a working time clock in the last one. We had stop watches for the kids and we were screaming at them, hoping they could hear us under water.
“We now have the ability to personalize workouts for each swimmer, having 20 different times set for 20 different swimmers. We use the big scoreboard to display these workouts so everyone in the pool can see their times.
“We have underwater speakers so we can talk to them while they are swimming, give them things to think about and ‘politely’ remind them what they are doing wrong while they are training.
“We have equipment that can help with their start, turn, and relay take-offs. If we couldn’t train the way that we did, then this win would not have been possible.
“It has become very popular that other teams in the area have asked to rent ours out for a week or two just to be able to have the facilities. We have not been able to accommodate them because our team uses it during the times that they requested because it has been when the Varsity team was training, as well,” Lang said.