RIVERSIDE – Edgar Chin powered his hands into the wall, turned toward the timing board and unleashed a primal scream of colliding emotions.
The promise the Fairmont Prep swimmer showed early in the CIF-SS Division 4 finals Friday night had been realized and his worries washed away in a flash.
The junior broke the 12-year-old meet-record in the 100-yard breaststroke by blazing to a lifetime-best and winning time of 56.54 seconds to punctuate a record-setting final at a cool-but-dry Riverside City College.
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Chin defended his title by clipping the 2003 Division 4 standard of Dan Simonsen of Bonita of La Verne and became the first Orange County swimmer to qualify for the inaugural state meet next week in Fresno.
He signaled his intentions by rallying to capture the 200 individual medley in a lifetime-best 1:58.91. He split the breaststroke more than 2 seconds faster than runner-up Sean Edwards of Nordhoff (2:01.17).
“Honestly, the IM would determine (how) I would swim in the breaststroke,” Chin said. “It would either give me an extreme moral boost or it would completely bring me down. It worked out well.”
After the breaststroke, Chin quickly walked to his Trident of Rowland Heights club coach, Michael Cody, delivered a hug and thanked him.
“The record meant that all the work that I had done so far had paid off,” Chin said.
Cerritos’ boys and girls swept the team titles on a night that featured eight records.
La Quinta freshman Catherine Tran finished eighth in the 200 IM (2:20.67) and backstroke (1:04.53) and Ocean View’s Christian Estiamba touched eighth in the butterfly (55.40).
Contact the writer: dalbano@ocregister.com
