STINGRAYS SPARK - TEAMUNIFY
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The
Stingrays Spark
April 2021 Metrowest YMCA Swim Team Newsletter
Happy New Year Stingrays!
Dear Stingrays families,
We just began our ‘Long’ Course Season after pulling an unusual Short Course
Season! While the pandemic is still around, this is a good time to reflect once again on
everything that we have been able to accomplish as a team. We are lucky to have great
swimmers, dedicated parents/volunteers and wonderful coaching staff working hard together
for our team to run the number of meets we had. Considering the pool availabilities and
Contact Us everything going on this past season, we gave our swimmers more chances to compete and
Comments, improve. We actually were able to host more meets than most of others in the league.
suggestion or
This past season was a great opportunity for all of us to witness the real strength of our
newsworthy
team. While coaches and swimmers worked hard during practices, the parents volunteered
item for the
to ensure safe and smooth conduct of the swim meets. Behind the scene, we have a Parent
newsletter can Committee, comprised of 10-15 parent volunteers, that works very closely with the coaches
be sent to: and the Y management. The committee assists on many functions in the background for the
dsbangari@gmail.com team, such as planning parties, swim meets, gifts, websites, videos, photos, newsletters,
diversity, fund raising, budgeting, officiating, policies, Safe Sport, and more. Some of our
committee members have been with the team for a long time, and we can't thank them
enough making the team better. Our current committee members are Dan Dube, Rob &
Sandy Dupcak, Peter Liu, Jessie Lu, Timothy & Cindy Loo, Ching & Haruru Lee, Seta
Abrahamian, Chart Sawatdiphong, Prita Vaidya, Dinesh Bangari, and Edenia Giang. If you
would like to be part of the committee in the future, please let our committee
leader Dan Dube (dpdube@gmail.com) know.
It is a great pleasure to bring to you in this edition of the newsletter, some high level recap
of most important team news and upcoming events. As always, please do reach out if you
have any ideas/stories/contributions for the future editions of the newsletter.
Have a safe and wonderful long course season!
Go Stingrays!
THE STINGRAYS SPARK April 2021
State of the Stingrays Swimming
By: Dan Dube, MWYS Parent Committee/Swim Meet Officials Lead
These last two years has been a very big challenge for the sport of swimming during this
time of COVID. We had a period of time where no swimming was taking place across the
nation. Long Course 2020 was a complete loss. The USA swimming memberships are down
30% and New England swimming is down almost 40%. We have been fortunate to have our
swimmer memberships as high as it’s ever been.
How did the MetroWest YMCA Stingrays respond? We spent the summer doing Zoom
dryland exercises to keep in shape and stay connected to one another. As things started to
open up, we were able to secure pool rental at CRA, expand pool time at the YMCA and at
Wayside. Many teams struggled to get any practice time, many teams folded with
swimmers looking for new teams. We hung in there!
The next phase was to be able to run our own swim meet. In order to run a meet, we needed
officials and lots of volunteers. We were able to run 8 meets and attend 2 other meets
during this short course season. The amount of meets and practice time hardly changed
much from prior years. We couldn’t have done it without all the families helping out and
coach Lavinia finding that precious pool time. Many colleges shut their pools down and
most still are shut down.
We all hope that the next Long course season starts to get closer to a normal year of
swimming. Hopefully the Olympics this summer will get kids excited to get back to the
pool.
Graduating MWYS Swimmers
Congratulations to the following senior Stingrays swimmers who will be
graduating this summer and are headed to college!
• Alex Gu - Tufts University
• Jiming Xu - Amherst College
• Armen Abrahamian - Cornell
University
• Brian Cheung - TBD
Former MWYS Swimmer Headed to Olympic Trial
Roger Gu (Tufts Univ), a former MWYS swimmer
as he is one of 27 NE Swimming Olympic Trials
qualifiers.
Congratulations Roger and best wishes for the
qualifiers!
Page 2 of 7
THE STINGRAYS SPARK April 2021
The Stingrays (MWYS) thank Mr. Dan Dube
Our Official Of the Year!
This season has been a great season for our swim team and we believe that none of our
success would be possible without Mr. Dube (Dan). Responding to the challenges brought
by the pandemic, Dan was instrumental in partnering with head coach Lavinia, the YMCA
management and parent committee to arrange swim meets this season. As an experienced
swim meet official, Dan took it a notch higher and helped the MWYS host multiple meets
this season- more than we have ever hosted! The team captains and parent committee in
collaboration with the coaches felicitated Dan during our last short course swim meet held
at the YMCA pool. At the event, team captains Brian Cheung, Armen Abrahamian, Ava
Yablonski, Laura Dube presented a few gift items to Dan as our token of thanks and
appreciation for his extraordinary leadership. Quite fittingly, Dan was also presented the
‘Official of The Year’ plaque.
Thank you Dan!
Thanks to team captains, coach Lavinia, and the parent committee especially
Haruru Lee and Haiko Kawakubo for facilitating this event. A video recording of the
event is also available. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ceyKovtONW4&t=1441s
MWYS Swimmer in News: Ava Yablonski
Congratulations to former Stingrays swimmer Ava Yablonski for committing to University
of Minnesota, MN. Ava, currently a junior in the Dover-
Sherborn Regional High School, will join the UMN Swim and
Dive team in Fall 2022. Ava was with the MWYS for over 8
years and was one of the team captains. We are so proud of Ava’s
accomplishments and wish her continued athletic and academic
success.
Congratulations Ava!
Photo credit: Swimswam.com/Ava Yablonski
Page 3 of 7
THE STINGRAYS SPARK April 2021
Upcoming Swim Meets
Meet, Location When
Invitational May Meet, CRA Pool, Wellesley 8 May 2021
May meet at YMCA, MWYS Pool, Framingham 28-30 May 2021
How should you mentally approach practice?
A Message From the Head Coach Lavinia
Swimmer's should ask themselves a few key
questions:
• How many practices do you attend each
week?
• Are you going to all of the available
workouts?
• How often do you attend early for practice?
• How often are you late?
• Are you remembering to bring all of your
equipment? Water bottle? Recovery snack?
• What is your effort level at practice?
• Are you pushing yourself or just going
through the motions?
Only after examining your logistical approach and actions when preparing for
practice, can you then achieve a deeper understanding of how you might be able to
improve your mental approach to practice.
ACTIONS ALWAYS SPEAK LOUDER THAN WORDS!
Here is another roadworthy article on swimmers’ mindset.
https://www.swimmingworldmagazine.com/news/a-key-to-unlocking-your-speed-a-positive-mindset/
MWYS Swimmers Excelling at High School
Swimming
Many of our senior swimmers also swim for their High School teams.
Congratulations to Stingrays swimmers Laura Dube (Junior, FHS) and Ashwina Bangari
(Freshman at FHS), both also swimming for Framingham High School Swimming and
Diving team, for setting Varsity and Freshman records!
Laura Dube set one Varsity record: 100 Breast (1:06.83)
Ashwina Bangari set two Freshman records: 200 Free (2:02.14), And 100 Back (1:01.08)
Page 4 of 7
THE STINGRAYS SPARK April 2021
MWYS Swimmers IMX Challenge
Congratulations to the following swimmers for completing their IM Extreme (IMX)
Challenge. This challenge is aimed at encouraging young swimmers to be all rounded in all
strokes (IM = Individual Medley) rather than being limited to one or two strokes.
Swimmers earn points based on their participation in qualifying swim events.
MWYS Swimmers who completed the IMX Challenge
9 year old 10 year old 11 year old 12 year old
Jack Galalis (2780) Abhi Bangari Abhi Bangari Kevin Jia (2447)
Riley Goodrich (2379) (1943) Rex Li (2204)
(1526) Jack Galalis (2331) Serena Loo (1768) Caroline Ho (1734)
Amanda Chen Evan Giang (2021) Dennis Zhou (1169) Maxwell Qi (1345)
(1152) Kyra Torrijos Kyle Zhang (1087) Alison Sham (1321)
Katherine Zheng (2013) Sona Abrahamyan
(898) Serena Loo (1989) (812)
Lidia Qi (582) Norah Yang (1583)
Christopher Pan
(1507)
Kyle Zhang (1341)
Makoto Lee (1067)
Sarah Sun (1015)
13 year old 14 year old 15 year old 16 year old
Zack Zhang (2483) Ethan Lu (2659) Joseph Sun (1428) Laura Dube (3354)
Alexander Lu Brandon Liu (2479) Irene Yang (3214)
(1507) David Huynh (2195) Michelle Li (2469)
Katelyn Huynh Alexandra Loo
(1391) (1203)
Derek Qi (1648) Alex Qi (596)
Alexandra Loo
(1426)
Kevin Zhu (681)
Alex Qi (584)
IMX and IMR certificates from NE Swimming will be awarded during our End of Year
Awards event.
Page 5 of 7
THE STINGRAYS SPARK April 2021
MWYS is a USA Swimming ‘Safe Sport Club’
MWYS achieved USA Swimming’s Safe Sport Club Recognition. This recognition reflects
our commitment to providing a healthy and positive environment free from abuse for all
team members.
USA Swimming is committed to safeguarding all of its
members with the welfare of its athlete members as top
priority. Safe Sport is USA Swimming’s comprehensive
abuse prevention program and provides tools for swim
clubs to educate their members. In order to apply
for Safe Sport Club Recognition, we were required to
develop and implement club governance measures, Safe Sport policies and reporting
mechanisms, Safe Sport best practices, as well as training to athletes and parents. All of
these measures were reviewed by USA Swimming Safe Sport staff for
approval. Our Safe Sport Club Recognition status is valid for two years.
Many thanks to Haruru Lee, our MWYS Safe Sport Coordinator for leading this successful
effort. Thanks also to all parents, swimmers and coaches for your help in this important
accomplishment.
We are excited to have achieved this milestone and to publicly demonstrate our commitment
to providing a Safe Sport environment on this team. In order to continue to
incorporate Safe Sport into our club’s culture, USA Swimming suggests clubs to be creative.
If you have any ideas to implements Safe Sport into our culture in creative way, please reach
out to Haruru (oishimango@gmail.com).
2021 End of Short Course Awards Ceremony
May 2, 2021 (07:00 PM - 08:30 PM)
Registration Deadline: May, 2 2021
We will be hosting a virtual End of Short Course Season Party this year. At this awards
ceremony we will do a slideshow of pictures through the season with interactive polling of
questions, trivia games, and awards with speeches from the coaches for the Most
Improved and Hardest Working Swimmers in each age group.
We will also be recognizing our graduating seniors: Armen Abrahamian, Brian Cheung,
Alex Gu and Jiming Xu. We have a special photo montage of these accomplished swimmers
through the years to share.
Please mark your calendars and try to attend this team building virtual recognition event.
Contact Seta Abrahamian (seta@abrahamian.info) for more information.
Soon we will also be sending out information about a socially distant, swim team family
hike at Hopkinton or Ashland State Park for the team where all awards will be given
out. Please keep an eye on your email inbox for more information.
Page 6 of 7
THE STINGRAYS SPARK April 2021
Stingrays in Action:
Swimmers, Coaches, Officials and Parent
Volunteers
Page 7 of 7
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