“I just had a bunch of joy and excitement,” Alaniz said. “I was just over the moon honestly.”
As Alaniz swam back down his lane to greet his grandparents and teammates, junior Carlos Arzate shouted to Alaniz that he’d broken the 40-year -old school record.
“It still feels a little unreal,” Alaniz said. “I didn’t think I would actually hit it. I was planning on hitting that at state, but now I’m just planning on improving.”
The previous record was set by Dale Briscoe in 1984 when SHS was a 3A and had to compete with 5A due to the low number of swim programs below 5A.
”I first broke the record in Monahans as a junior,” said Briscoe, who now lives in Fort Stockton. “Then, my senior year, I broke it twice more. The final record was set in regionals in Lubbock against 5A swimmers.”
The swimmers will compete at the state meet in Josh Davis Natatorium in North East Independent School District in San Antonio on Feb. 13-14.
Alaniz’s time at regionals was 55:13 seconds, topping Briscoe’s 1984 record of 55.83 seconds.
”I’m just glad to say finally that someone broke it,” Briscoe said. “I’m kind of glad to see someone do it.”
The coach during Briscoe’s time at SHS was Coach Tim Sage, current Coach Danielle Sim’s father.
“Gabryl broke the record from 1984,” Sims said. “Briscoe’s daughter actually has the school record as a female. So it’s amazing that Gabryl broke it.”
Alaniz qualified for state in three events.
“Gabryl has put I’m a lot of effort,” Sims said. “He did kind of play catch up coming off the football season. He started late into swim, so he had to put in a lot of effort to make this happen.”
Alaniz will join junior Carlos Arzate, junior Ashton Booth and sophomore Austin Peters at state in the 200-yard and 400-yard freestyle relays.
“I was very excited to know we had qualified for state,” Booth said, “even though I was much slower than the person I replaced.”
Booth replaced graduate Jeremiah Wolf from last year’s state-qualifying relay.
“On our 400 relay, he (Booth) cut, I think, two seconds off his part of the 100,” Peters said. “So that was really good. That’s what helped up get to state.”
The two relays had to wait until evening after the regional meet to find out that their wild card times qualified them for state.
“There was a lot of pressure, with breaking school records, being the new guy and replacing someone much taller and faster than I am,” Booth said. “So yeah, there was a lot of pressure during that.”
Arzate praised Booth.
“He stepped up by losing more time, and getting faster so we had a better chance,” Arzate said. “We have a good bond. We’re really close, and we spend a lot of time together.”
Arzate also credited the team’s success to coaching.
“She’s (Sims) helped me believe in myself when I don’t think I can improve,” Arzate said. “She tells me I can do it.”
