Senior swimmer Carly Bush came into her final season as a member of the Grand Valley State University women’s swimming and diving team with her eyes on breaking the 1,000-yard freestyle and 200-yard fly pool records.

Entering the final meet of her career Saturday at the GVSU pool, her goals remained just that — until the meet began.

Bush and her teammates set eight new pool records at GVSU on their way to sweeping the dual meet against the University of Findlay by a score of 159-74. The men (6-2, 4-0 GLIAC) also swam and outscored Findlay, 170-41.

“It felt amazing,” Bush said. “I set up the goals to beat those a while ago. It feels great, and no words can describe how I feel right now.

Bush kicked off her day setting the 1,000-yard freestyle record (10 minutes, 22.01 seconds, Wenger from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee) with a time of 10:16.22. She then broke the 200-yard butterfly (2:07.22, Tan from Northern Michigan University) with her time of 2:06.49.

The senior was also a member of the record-setting 800-yard freestyle relay team, in which she teamed with sophomores Kristen Emerson and Caitlyn Madsen and senior Sarah Kosmak. The team clocked in with a time of 7:49.34, breaking the old record of 7:56.94 held by Oakland University.

The GVSU men got in on the record-breaking action as well, setting five new pool records. Seniors Aaron Beebe, David Hayhow and Joe Sayre and junior Derek Mead broke the 800-yard freestyle relay (6:53.79, University of Indianapolis) with a time of 6:49.76. Beebe also set a new mark in the 200-yard freestyle (1:41.91, Schrotenboer from GVSU) in his opening leg of the 800-yard relay. Beebe clocked in with a time of 1:41.66.

GVSU’s men also set records in the 1000-yard freestyle, 200-yard individual medley and the 200-yard backstroke. Senior David Hayhow broke the 1000-yard freestyle (9:31.81, Erard from Wayne State University) with a time of 9:30.26. The 200-yard individual medley (1:55.06, Abascal from Wayne State) was broken by freshman Milan Medo, who swam a 1:54.63. For the final men’s record, senior Raphael Santos managed to break the 200-yard backstroke (1:51.88, Schrotenboer from Oakland) in his final meet in the GVSU pool with a time of 1:50.62.

“We really have been working extremely hard,” said head coach Andy Boyce. “To be able to come out and swim like they did and dive like they did is pretty incredible. We had two divers qualify for the national championships today.”

Sophomore Katie Vulpetti and freshman Paul Swedenborg were able to make national marks. Vulpetti scored 283.28 points in the 1-meter dive, and Swedenborg posted a score of 297.01.

“I was really excited to make the national cut,” Swedenborg said. “As a freshman, I’m still pretty new at this and it’s kind of overwhelming.”

Boyce was proud of his team for how they came out on senior day. He cites this senior class as one of the instrumental reasons for the programs recent success.

“This class has done all kinds of things on the national level and the conference level,” he said. “They’ve been a part of our top 10 finishes on the national level the past three years. Before this group came here, we’ve never been in the top 10 on the national level.”

The Lakers resume action this Friday at 5 p.m. against Hope College in Holland, Mich.

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