ST. JOSEPH, Minn. – In the final weekend of her collegiate swim and dive career, Ana Birklid put together a weekend that every student-athletes dream of.
To wrap up her time with the College of Saint Benedict swim and dive team, Birklid competed in seven races – three as an individual and four with a relay – and she set school records in all but one of them.
For her record-setting weekend, Birklid is this week’s CSB Athlete of the Week.
To kick off the week, Birklid teamed up with Madison Slavik, Jessica Milstroh and Emi Wagner to set a school record in the 200 medley relay. The foursome finished the race in 1:47.77 – more than three-tenths of a second faster than the previous record. And that was just the beginning for Birklid.
Birklid set two more records each day for the remainder of the four-day MIAC Championships – one individual record and one relay record. Thursday was the 200 IM and the 400 medley relay. Birklid broke her own 200 IM record in Thursday morning’s prelims, and a few hours later she took fourth in the event in 2:06.17 – two seconds faster than her prelim time, and good enough for All-MIAC Honorable Mention. She also teamed up with Slavik, Milstroh and Wagner to set another relay record, this time finishing the 400 medley in 3:56.57 – four seconds faster than the previous record that had stood since 2012.
Friday, Birklid broke one of the oldest records on the Bennie swim and dive record board. After swimming a personal-best in the 200 free Friday morning, she dropped another six-tenths of a second in the finals and finished fourth in 1:54.05 – 35 seconds faster than the record set by All-American Gretchen Weber in 1999. She also added her name to the record books in another relay - the 200 free relay - with Milstroh, Jocie Larson and Wagner. The foursome finished in 1:36.93, the second-best time in school history. They also became the first All-MIAC relay team since 2011-12 after taking third.
On the fourth and final day of the meet Saturday, Birklid finished her career strong. She set the school’s 200 backstroke record, and added another relay record, this time in the 400 free relay. After recording a career-best time in the morning session, she took two seconds off of that to finish in 2:04.49, to take over the school record set by former teammate Mikayla Von Wahlde.
Birklid ended the meet with Milstroh, Lindsay Smutka and Wagner as the foursome finished the 400 free relay in 3:33.96, .15 seconds faster than the previous record set in 2016.
Birklid wraps up her career with eight school records – five individual records and three relay records – and eight other time in the top 10 in program history. She earned a trio of All-MIAC honors thanks to top-three finishes, as well as seven All-MIAC Honorable Mention accolades in her three trips to the conference meet.
