Green, Lady Tankers bag podium finishes in respective UAAP swimming meets

The DLSU Green and Lady Tankers made significant strides this year in their quest to bring the title back to Taft as they both claimed podium finishes in the UAAP Season 78 Swimming Competition, which was held at the Rizal Memorial Complex Swimming Pool. Improving from their fourth-place finish last season, the Green Tankers ended their campaign with 286 points, good for second place in the standings. Meanwhile, the Lady Tankers landed in third place for the second year in a row with 177 points.

The annual UAAP swimming meet was once again dominated by DLSU’s archrivals, the Ateneo Blue Eagles, who swept the competition by claiming both the men’s and women’s divisions. They finished with overall scores of 563 and 428 points, respectively.

The Green Tankers snagged gold medals in two events behind the efforts of Rookie of the Year Arian Neil Puyo, and the team of Alfonso Bautista, Troy Espiritu, Red Silvestre, and Miguel Narciso. Puyo came in first in the 200-Meter Backstroke event as he finished with a time of 2:10.98, a second faster than ADMU’s Gerard Reyes. Meanwhile, the group of Bautista, Espiritu, Silvestre, and Narciso broke the UAAP record of the 200-Meter Free Relay after completing the race with a time of 1:38.21, barely beating UP’s time of 1:40.56 and ADMU’s 1:40.68. With this, the Green Tankers were able to boost their running score to take second place overall after making podium finishes in more than half of the events.

On the other hand, Sabrina Ingrid Ilustre brought the Lady Tankers their sole first place finish in the 200-Meter Breaststroke event as she clocked in 2:48.54, putting a three-second distance between her and UP’s Joy Rodgers who came in first in the preliminaries. In addition, Ilustre and Catherine Bondad brought in more points with their runner-up finishes in three events. The Lady Tankers also baggedtwo more silver medals from relay events and three bronze medals to finish third in the overall tally.

Armed with good finishes, the DLSU Tankers had no problems in overtaking General Championship race rival UST, who finished fourth in both the men’s and women’s division with scores of 120 and 113 points, respectively.

With the Green Tankers improving their ranking by two notches and the Lady Tankers maintaining third place, the DLSU Swimming Team will look to finally clinch gold next season. Buoyed by the strong showing of rookie sensation Puyo, and the continued ascent of Silvestre for the Green Tankers and Illustre for the Lady Tankers, both teams are poised to make greater waves in the seasons to come.