Guerra wins CIF championships in 100 free and 100 back - Warriors sixth as a team

Fallbrook High School junior Bobby Guerra won both the 100-yard freestyle race and the 100-yard backstroke event at the CIF swim meet May 24 at Granite Hills High School.

Guerra also erased the swim team’s oldest school record with his backstroke performance during the May 21 preliminaries at Granite Hills.

The Warriors finished sixth as a team. “We moved up a spot from last year,” said Fallbrook coach Bill Richardson.

The CIF meet also included the diving championships May 23 at Mesa College. Four different individuals – Guerra, sophomore Toby Fast, and divers Ricky Stephens and Casey Eich - qualified for the CIF finals, and Fallbrook also reached the finals for all three relay events. The top six times in each event at the swim preliminaries earned lanes in the championship finals while the next six times qualified those swimmers or relay teams for the consolation finals.

Stephens, a junior during the 2014 swim season, compiled 219.60 points on six dives to place third. The CIF meet debut of Eich gave Fallbrook 11th-place team points due to the freshman’s 167.20 individual points.

Guerra won the 100-yard freestyle in 46.17 seconds. “There was really nobody close,” Richardson said.

The second-place finisher, Torrey Pines 11th-grader Stephen Park, had a time of 47.25 seconds. Guerra also had the fastest time in the preliminaries, completing his four laps in 46.18 seconds. Park’s time of 48.06 seconds placed second in the preliminaries.

Guerra won the 100-yard backstroke in 52.67 seconds. “He fought his way and took a commanding lead,” Richardson said.

Scripps Ranch High School junior Anders Ohrstrom was second at 53.39 seconds.

In the preliminaries, Guerra had a time of 52.43 seconds, breaking the school record of 53.52 seconds set in 1995 by Doug Pearce. That was the last boys swim school record from the 20th century (for girls swim, the 200-yard freestyle record was set in 1988 and the 500-yard freestyle record has lasted since 1976). Ohrstrom’s time of 53.78 seconds was the second-fastest preliminaries swim in that event.

“He’s humble and he’s hard-working and he deserves all the accolades,” Richardson said of Guerra. “A lot of fun to watch just how hard he works at it and how impressive he is.”

Fast was Fallbrook’s only other swimmer to qualify for the finals as an individual. He finished 11th in the 500-yard freestyle with a time of 4:53.55 and 12th in the 200-yard freestyle at 1:50.34.

Both freestyle relay teams qualified for the championship race before placing fifth. The all-junior quartet of Victor Haywood, Guerra, Tristan Curnow, and Eli Foli completed the 200-yard freestyle race in 1:30.17. Fast, Haywood, senior Quinn Harrison, and Guerra raced for 3:18.46 in the 400-yard freestyle relay.

Haywood, Foli, Curnow, and Harrison comprised Fallbrook’s 200-yard medley relay team which finished 12th with a time of 1:49.08.