OCALA, Fla. — The Ave Maria Swimming and Diving team set 11 new school records over the weekend at the Sun Conference Championships. The men set nine new high marks for the program while the women set three. As a team, both the men and the women each finished fifth of nine teams.

The Gyrene men basically rewrote the record book with eight new records. On the swimming side, Lucas Thomaz, Jack Keyser and Elijah Brown each set two records while Michael Blawas set one.
Thomaz set the record in both 50-yard and 100-yard butterfly. The 50-yard record was the first split of his 100-yard record breaking time as he beat a swimmer from Life in a 1-on-1 timed final. Thomaz also hit the NAIA B-mark in the 100-yard butterfly.

Keyser broke the record in both the 200-yard individual medley and the 200-yard breaststroke. The freshman broke the IM record as he won the B-Final and placed ninth overall. His 200-yard breaststroke record was also set in the B-Final for the event with Keyser finishing 12^th overall.

Brown was the last Gyrene with multiple records broken as he set the new high marks in the 400-yard individual medley and the 200-yard backstroke. Like Keyser, Brown set his individual medley record in the B-Final and placed 10^th overall. His record-breaking swim in the backstroke came in the preliminaries and qualified him for the A-Final, in which he placed seventh.

Blawas set one record in the 200-yard butterfly, finishing in seventh place in the A-Final just like Brown. Blawas had broken the school record in the 100-yard butterfly on February 6 but was quickly passed by Thomaz who swam a faster time the next day in the timed final.

Over at the diving boards, Nathaniel Ramirez set the final record for the Gyrene men with a score of 162.50 in the 3-meter diving.

The Gyrene women set three records during their stay in Ocala. Two of the records were team relay records while the third went to Mimi Estrada.

In the 200-yard medley relay, Gabby Darakchieva, Madeline Lasnoski, Maryanna Matista and Estrada beat the previous mark set by last year's championship relay team by over a second.

In the 200-yard freestyle relay, Delaney Weisbruch, Matista, Lasnoski and Estrada beat the previous year's squad again, however by a much narrower margin of 0.14 seconds.

The lone individual record went to Estrada in the 50-yard butterfly. It was the first 50 yards in the 100-yard butterfly A-Final, in which the freshman finished eighth.

As a team, both the men and women finished in fifth place. Neither team had a medal winner during the championships but had very strong swims all throughout the weekend.

Keiser won both the men's and women's competitions. Teams the Gyrenes beat included Life, Loyola, Thomas and New College.

The Gyrenes now wait patiently for the NAIA Championship qualifiers to be announced. Ave Maria had 19 NAIA B-cut times during the Sun Conference Championships and even more throughout the season. If any Gyrenes qualify for the National Championships, they will head to Elkhart, Indiana, March 4-7.