Norwich’s Aurora Strauch swims the breaststroke during the Tornado’s first home meet of the season against Windsor. Strauch helped Norwich to a fifth place finish during the 200 yard freestyle relay at Saturday’s Waverly Invite. (Keith Lanfear Photo

WAVERLY – Placing sixth at the Waverly Invitational a season ago, the Norwich Purple Tornado swim team moved up three places to finish third the 2019 meet.

Norwich went back and forth between second and third place throughout the invite, battling with Maine-Endwell for the high finish but it was the Spartans who pulled into the No. 2 position as the M-E scored 377 team points to the Tornado’s 338.

“Although it was only our second meet,” said Norwich’s head coach Saundra Gantt, “it was a great meet to move the girls around and see where they will swim best for the team at sectionals. We had many best times and great races for the girls.”

In the three relay events – 200 yard medley, 200 yard freestyle and 400 yard freestyle – the Lady Tornado teams finished in the top five of each race. In the 200 yard medley, where the Norwich foursome placed third, Angela Carlson swam the second fastest time out of all teams as she swam the last 50 yards in freestyle.

Carlson placed first in the 50 yard freestyle individual event, swimming a time of 26.61 and two-tenths of a second faster than the second place finisher. In the medley, the Norwich junior swam a 25.82 split to help secure a third place finish with a sprinting, all-out, comeback effort.