Stoughton High School’s boys swim season lasts from November to February. All swimmers are expected to attend morning and afterschool practices and weekly meets that commonly occur over the weekend. Across the season, the athletes continuously dedicate themselves to breaking PRs and building a strong team environment. This year, the team showed up to achieve record-breaking results and bring a team of six boys to state.
Austin Ayers was this year’s head coach and played a large part in the team’s success this season.
“This team was great. We’ve got a third-place finish for our relay, the best in school history, and seven school records, so that’s almost completely wiping the current school record board. We are extremely excited about how the season went,” Ayers said.
The boys pulled off a 7th overall placing at the Division 2 state meet with a 3rd place finish in the 200 medley relay and a 4th place finish in the 200 freestyle relay for the team of Julian Callendar, Gavin Reiser, Josh Phillips, and Micheal Herheim.
“I think the outcome [at state] was expected. I don’t think that the times were, though,” said Michael Herheim, one of this year’s co-captains. “The times were definitely an improvement of what we hoped for.”
The most notable swimmer of the meet was senior Julian Callendar, who took home the win in the 100 breast and a 2nd place finish in the 100 medley.
Callendar’s first-place finish in the 100-meter breaststroke cemented his three-year streak as state champion in this event, setting yet another new school record.
“Training this year was a little bit different to support Julian; he did harder workouts than some of the other lanes, whereas last year, he did a lot of the same workouts as the entire team. We just wanted to challenge him a little bit more, especially since it’s his last year,” Ayers said.
A new development this season, along with changes to training, was Callendar’s sponsorship from A3 Performance, a swimming brand based in Wisconsin.
“[A3] gave me some free gear before state, so I was glad that I could represent them on the state podium,” Callendar said.
Although no current student-athletes at SHS hold a sponsorship, the athletics program is optimistic about athletic opportunities for students in the future.
“We talked a little bit with Athletic Director Andy Alexander, and she’s been trying to see what sponsorships will look like in the future for high school athletes, but that issue never came up for Julian,” Ayers said.
Following this historic season for the boys swim program, the team is set to look quite a bit different without the graduating senior class.
“Five seniors are a lot of seniors that are gonna be gone. They make up a majority of our team chemistry, and they set the tone. This senior class is special, and so we’re definitely gonna miss them,” Ayers said.
Even as the season has finished, Callendar continues his training to prepare for future meets, hoping to gain new PRs and qualify for larger competitions.
“I have a meet in Puerto Rico next month that will qualify me for 2025 worlds,” Callendar said.
When asked what advice he would give Julian for the future, Ayers said, “Keep working hard and don’t lose sight of what’s important. Swimming is a great sport and can be kind of a safe space where you can grow and challenge yourself, but its not everything. There’s more to life than just swimming…try and figure out what life looks like beyond it.”
As of right now, Callendar stays uncommitted to a university for swimming, but he has made it clear that he intends to swim for the next four years.