FORT MYERS, Fla. — The Ave Maria Swim team opened their 2025-26 season Friday by hosting a dual meet with conference foe New College of Florida. Ave Maria dominated the meet with both the men and women beating the Mighty Banyans. The Gyrenes broke six school records during the meet and recorded 52 new personal bests across the whole team.

Freshman Mimi Estrada set the first two school records in the opening event of the meet. During the 100-yard butterfly, Estrada beat the mark for both the fastest time across all 100 yards, touching the pad at 59.09, and the fastest 50-yard split, swimming the first half of the race in just 27.61 seconds.

The men also set a school record in the 100-yard butterfly, with freshman John Keyser swimming the fastest 50-yard split in 24.37 seconds. Keyser was unable to set the record for the fastest time in all 100-yards but was just two seconds behind the mark.

Keyser set another split record for the Gyrenes in the 100-yard breaststroke. In his first 50 yards, the freshman clocked in at 24.48 seconds. Madeline Lasnoski set the same record on the women's side, swimming her first 50 yards of the back stroke in the 33.64 seconds.

The final broken school record of the day came in the penultimate event of the meet, the men's 100-yard individual medley. This time, it was the full race record that was broken, and Keyser was once again the culprit. In the event that mashes up all four different strokes, Keyser finished the race in 54.82 seconds. He beat the previous record, which was set by Eli Pelzer in 2023, by almost a full second. Sam Pilkington also beat the mark set by Pelzer nearly two years to the day earlier but was just a half-second behind Keyser at 55.38.

Outside of the school records, 52 personal bests were set in the season opener. The women set 27 individual highs while the men had 25.

As a team, the Gyrenes won eight of the nine of the 11 events in the meet, with the men doing a clean sweep of their five events. The two teams also competed in a mixed relay to end the meet, with the Gyrenes winning that race too.

In the final point totals, the men's team beat New College 743-29 and the women's team won 658-101.

Ave Maria's next meet is October 25 as they head up to Georgia to compete in a tri-meet against former Sun Conference opponent Thomas and NCAA Division II West Florida.