Stingrays celebrate successful season
HOLTVILLE — While the city of Holtville may be smaller in population compared to its neighbors, there is no shortage of eager young athletes waiting to take up a sport.
In the summer months, that sport is usually swimming, with the Holtville Stingray Swim Team serving as the rec team from May through July.
In previous summers, the team made due with its annual participants, yet this year a new and energized board jumped on the opportunity to grow the program.
“Locally, we made flyers and left some at schools and farmer’s markets and tried to go to as many local, public functions as possible,” said board President Lourdes Fusi.
Last season, the team had about 50 swimmers and this year with the added promotional push was able to increase that number to just over 70.
Fusi said seeing the spike in participation was exciting and more so at the end of the season when the team qualified more than 20 athletes for the Imperial Valley Swim League Championships in Yuma.
“The kids needed to meet certain requirements to compete at (IVSLCs), so it was amazing the amount of kids that made it this year for us,” Fusi said. “Last year we only had five.”
While the program benefited from the support of local sponsors and more promotion before the start of the season, Fusi also credited the team’s success in the water to its new head coach.
In addition to more athletes, the program also brought in Heather Duarte, who has been involved with local swimming for a number of years now, and a junior coaching program.
“It was a blessing,” said Keri Valdez, board treasurer. “(Heather) is so phenomenal. She’s stern and also she’s organized and very sensitive in the right areas, so it’s perfect. She has the knowledge and love for this sport to guide (the kids) along.”
As a board member, Valdez said it was gratifying to see the team perform the way it did over the past few months.
“It made us proud,” Valdez said. “We pushed and promoted so much, so to see the success of it was very exciting. We’re hoping to get bigger next year.”
As a parent, Valdez said she thoroughly enjoyed seeing her children compete this summer.
“My daughter was on the team last year, but not my son,” she said. “This was his first year. Every day they were so excited to go and my son would actually cry if I didn’t take him.”
Given the team’ success this year, both Fusi and Valdez said they were looking forward to next season and ensuring the continued growth of the small-yet-growing and proud program.
“We’re looking to having more kids, more parent participation and more community knowledge of how successful our town can be,” Valdez said.