INDIANAPOLIS — One of the great careers of Crawfordsville boys swimming came to an end on Saturday. Senior Whitman Horton swam in the final two races of his historic CHS career in the consolations of the 200 IM and 100 backstroke. On Friday in the prelims, Horton placed 14th in the 200 IM with a time of 1:53.39 and just nearly missed swimming in the finals of the 100 backstroke with a time of 50.61 finishing .03 away from getting to place on the podium. However Horton put both of those races in the back of his mind and concluded his career in the best way he knew how... to race fast. In the consolations of the IM Horton finished 11the in the state with a time of 1:53.78 while in the backstroke he won the consolations with a time of 50.47.
His time in the backstroke when everything was finished was the 6th fastest overall time.
After his races were over and Horton’s Athenian career came to an end, Crawfordsville coach Kevin Hedrick, as he has all season spoke extremely highly of Horton.
“Ending their careers on a high note is what champions do and he’s been a champion for a very long time,” Hedrick said. “We know Whit is going to go off to Williams College and continue to be a champion. What he was able to do today and come back and swim better than he did the day before was not surprising to me at all.”
Horton put things in perspective after his swims and talked about being able to overcome a disappointing night on Friday to make sure that he would end his season how we wanted.
“As best as we try to prepare, sometimes things don’t’ always go the way you want them to and that’s what Friday was,” he said. “My preparation was a little off and that’s a learning moment for me. That’s what I love about this sport is that swimming teaches you so many lessons and one of them is that you have to show up and push through whatever you’re going through. I obviously love to race and to compete and so that’s what my mindset was like for those final two races was to just race and good things were able to happen.”
For Horton, it’s a career with the Athenians that many people will remember for quite sometime. All the awards and accolades speak for themselves but Horton doesn’t speak on any of that. Instead he chose to speak on the memories he’s made and the friendships that he’s been blessed with while at CHS.
“It’s been an absolute pleasure to be an Athenian these last four years,” he said. “I’ve got to spend some amazing time with so many different guys over my time here. My first two years were a lot of learning while these last two have been doing the best that I can to take the wisdom that I’ve gained and try to pass that down to the new guys so we can continue the great culture we have here at Crawfordsville. I want this program to continue grow because it’s treated me so well and I just want to do my part to give back to it.”
