Bell sets pace at swim championship

In eight days and in two championship meets, Anna-Jonesboro Community High School senior Elizabeth Bell swam five events, bettering personal bests by more than 17 seconds while setting Saluki Swim Club marks in each.

Carbondale’s Shea Natatorium hosted the Ozark Long Course Championship July 17-20 and the University of Missouri hosted the USA Swimming Sectional July 22-25.

In the 50 meter freestyle, 26.75 seconds crashed through Amber Green’s 27.03. Green was the Illinois High School Association’s 2007 runner-up in the 50 free and now swims for Louisiana State University.

Like a good fish tale, it was the one that got away that was both exciting and disappointing. In 1991, a varsity SIU swimmer set the pool record with a 26.74, only .01 second faster than the prep schooler’s mark.

Bell is ranked the 21st fastest 17-year-old in the nation in the event.

In the 100 free, Bell’s 58.70 broke another of Amber Green’s marks by a comfortable margin. Green was IHSA champion in the event at the 2007 IHSA state finals.

It was not a big surprise that improvement was made in the 100 butterfly. Her own club record 1:05.35 was cut down to 1:03.10, a time ranking her as the nation’s twenty-fifth fastest.

Two very big surprises resulted from newly developing skills.

The 100 breaststroke record held by Lindsey Kolar was edged by a 1:15.50 sprint, and Bell destroyed Kolar’s 200 individual medley record by more than six seconds with a 8.23 second improvement. The new standard is 2:25.52.

Aug. 10, Bell and coach Jay Newton fly to Seattle, Wash., to swim the Junior National meet.