A light rain was falling, a breeze was blowing and it was unusually cool atop Lookout Mountain Monday night, but Joanna Poindexter never flinched when she realized she was headed for an unexpected dip in the pool at the Fairyland Club.

Poindexter is the coach of the Ooltewah Swim Club and nobody was any happier when her Tidal Waves captured their first win ever in the Chattanooga Area Swim League’s opening meet.

It was close for a while, but the visitors from north Hamilton County separated themselves with some strong performances in the butterfly event en route to a 344-328 victory in the season-opening meet for both teams.

“We’ve got a brand new team, but we don’t want to be looked at as the new kid on the block.

"What we have is a great bunch of kids who have worked really hard so far and they came up here tonight and swam extremely well,” Poindexter said prior to her knowing what the final score was.

“I personally hate to lose at anything, so we came up here looking for a win. It was a great first meet for both teams and we all had fun,” she added.

Ooltewah surged to a 57-51 lead after the opening freestyle event, but the Flash regained the advantage at 103-100 following the breaststroke.

Fairyland’s lead stretched to 151-140 after the medley relay and they were still on top at 183-176 following the individual medley.

The momentum shifted Ooltewah's way for the last time in the final three events.

The Tidal Waves had a six-point lead (236-230) following the backstroke and they all but put it out of reach with a 56-38 difference in the butterfly to take a commanding 292-268 lead with only the freestyle relay races remaining.

Fairyland closed the final gap some, but the deficit at that point was simply too much to overcome.

Despite the setback, Fairyland coach Kendall Jacobs had a smile on her face and plenty of reasons to be happy when the final results were in.

“This was a great learning experience for me and my team. We had time trials last week, but we swam so much faster today.

"Give those guys from Ooltewah a lot of credit. They came up here tonight and proved themselves.

“As you might expect for a first meet, we did a lot of things wrong, but we’ll get a lot better. All of these kids swam their hearts out and we all had a lot of fun. That’s what it’s all about,” the former GPS and Transylvania University swimmer added.

Sara Beth Moore and Blake Sinker both tallied 19 points to lead Ooltewah while Ansley Rogers and Jenny Rogers both scored 19 points for Fairyland.

Other high point scorers for Ooltewah included:

17 points -- Jeorgia Hicks, Gabby Claborn ,Bobby Claborn;
16 points – Ann Lee Gooder;
15 points – Ben Goocher, Rebekah Keller;
13 points – Summer Carlisle;
11 points – Mary Jo Sweringen;
10 points – Sara Malloch, Jacob Dohmeier, Luke Moore, Chris Intharongsa.

Other high point scorers for Fairyland included:

16 points – Ethan Bevill;
15 points – Ellen Anderson, Kylie Eiselstein;
14 points – Jack Jones, Matthew Jones;
12 points – Chase Holsonback, Simon Parker, Jack Young;
11 points – Nelson Eiselstein, Lucy Jones, Ruth Ann Rogers;
10 points – Natalie Berg, Natalie Lopez-Durel.

Both teams will be in action again on Monday and both will be on the road. Ooltewah will visit Cumberland while Fairyland will head to Fort Oglethorpe.

(Email John Hunt at tnmoose2002@aol.com)

The 2009 CASL swim season began with Fairyland playing host to a new team from Ooltewah. Click to enlarge.
- Photo2 by Michael Locke