Mahayla Allred gave up diving when she left middle school – until last Friday in a dual meet in Buffalo.
All of a sudden, the Cody freshman was back on the board and scoring well against Buffalo – on just two days of practice – and then competed again a day later in the Lady Bison Invite.
After not standing on a diving board for the better part of a year, Allred, whose mother Buffy is the Fillies coach and whose older sister Brylee is a swimmer, made the biggest splash in the family.
Mahayla scored 117.35 points in the opener and 112.35 points in the second meet. This is a turnabout after deciding to forfeit diving in high school.
“The reason I wanted to give it up was I thought I didn’t have enough time to swim,” the younger Allred said.
Coach Allred initially was not thrilled by that choice because the Fillies haven’t had a diver all year. As the season approaches its denouement at the state championships in early November, Mahayla is without a swim qualifying time. Suddenly, it does not seem impossible she can squeeze in by diving, if she can crack 140.
“Not yet,” she said. “But I have another week.”
Buffalo, a top team in 3A, bested Cody and three other schools with a score of 361 in the invitational, but the Fillies seem to be creeping closer to the Bisons with their 314 points.
With Aly Boysen on anchor, and Megan Boysen, Marissa Rosenbaum and Tayleigh Hopkin swimming other legs, Cody edged Buffalo in the 400-yard freestyle relay by .14 in a thrilling race that encouraged them.
“We’re hoping to beat Lander and Buffalo (at state), Hopkin said.
Boysen ripped a 2:07.57 personal record 200 freestyle over the weekend.
“It was really hard,” she said.
Buffy Allred was impressed with Boysen’s effort.
“The 200 was incredible,” the coach said. “Aly is a racer. You put her next to someone and she races.”
Hopkin, who would like to dip into the 26s, came closer with a 27.35 in the 50 free over the weekend.
“I’ll get it when we taper,” Hopkin said.
Also, Boysen nearly broke into the 25s with 26.02 50 free.
The Fillies have trained twice-a-day all season, but they will soon cut back to peak for championship meets after this week’s meets against Powell and at Sheridan.
“No more morning practices,” said Hopkin, who has her morning routine down to a science of always rising at 5:20 a.m.
Ally Boysen, who has qualified for state in all eight individual events as a freshman, won the 100-yard freestyle Friday in 57.75 seconds Saturday. Megan Boysen won 100 butterfly and the 100 backstroke Saturday and Brylee Allred took the 100 breaststroke.
Back at the diving board, Mahayla has resisted a return to diving all year. But the lure of potentially qualifying when she had not yet done so while swimming was a partial motivation. Teammate Cheyenne Farmer is exploring a move to diving and Mahayla was cajoled into showing her a few moves by assistant coach Amber Boysen.
At first, she said, “I’m not going to get tricked into it.” But once Mahayla began diving again her teammates reacted strongly with such comments as, “Holy cow, I didn’t know you could dive that well.”
Some 48 hours after her first dives of 2019, Mahayla began running up points for the Fillies. Now she is all in, at least for the rest of this season. Next year? “Hopefully, I can swim and dive,” she said.
Lady Bison-Cody
Fillies Dual
Cody Individuals
200 freestyle relay: 2) Cody (Taylen Stinson, Tayleigh Hopkin, Kaelee VanNortrick, Brylee Allred), 2:11.50; 4) Allie Ennist, Zelma Rudd, Emma Cook, Mahayla Allred), 2:47.64.
200 freestyle: 2) Ally Boysen, 2:07:57; 3) Megan Boysen, 2:17.04.
200 individual medley: 5) Rudd, 3:11.13; 6) Ennist, 3:16.99.
50 freestyle: 3) Hopkin, 27.35; 5) B. Allred, 29.12; 6) M. Allred, 33.20; 7) Cook, 33.65.
1-meter diving: 1) M. Allred, 117.35.; Cheyenne Farmer, dnf 100 butterfly: 3) Stinson, 1:34.81.
100 freestyle: 2) M. Boysen, 1:02.28; 5) Marissa Rosenbaum, 1:02.45; 6) VanNortrick, 1:08.15; 7) Farmer, 1:13.09.
500 freestyle: 4) B. Allred, 7:05.33; 6) Cook, 7:38.49; 7) Ennist, 7:47.65.
200 freestyle relay: 2) Cody (A. Boysen, M. Boysen, B. Allred, Rosenbaum), 1:49.41; 3) Cody (Farmer, M. Allred, Stinson, VanNortrick), 2:11.58.
100 backstroke: 4) A. Boysen, 1:14.22; 6) Hopkin, 1:23.07; 7) Rudd, 1:28.81.
100 breaststroke: 1) Rosenbaum, 1:22.97; 2) VanNortrick, 1:33.84; 3) Stinson, 1:35.06.
400 freestyle relay: 1) Cody (M. Boysen, Hopkin, Rosenbaum, A. Boysen), 4:06.67; 2) Cody (Cook, Ennist, Rudd, Farmer), 5:25.21.
Lady Bison Invitational
Teams: 1) Buffalo, 361; 2) Cody, 314; 3) Natrona, 186; 4) Newcastle, 145; 5) Douglas, 137.
Cody Individuals
200 medley relay: 1) Cody (M. Boysen, B. Allred, VanNortrick, A. Boysen), 2:03.23; 5) Cody (Stinson, Cook, Rudd, Farmer), 2:27.01.
200 freestyle: 2) Rosenbaum, 2:15.43; 6) M. Allred, 2:35.14; 8) Ennist, 2:47.78.
200 individual medley: 5) Hopkin, 2:41.36; 6) Cook, 3:20.27.
50 freestyle: 2) A. Boysen, 26.02; 5) VanNortrick, 30.41; 9) Farmer, 31.58; 13) Rudd, 34.13.
1-meter diving: 4) M. Allred, 112.35.
100 butterfly: 1) M. Boysen, 1:09.02; 5) VanNortrick, 1:15.28; 8) B. Allred, 1:17.94.
100 freestyle: 1) A. Boysen, 57.75; 5) Hopkin, 1:01.34; 11) Ennist, 1:14.61.
500 freestyle: 3) Rosenbaum, 6:19.84; 7) Stinson, 7:18.19.
200 freestyle relay: 2) Cody (B. Allred, VanNortrick, Hopkin, Rosenbaum), 1:54.98; 7) Cody (Rudd, Cook, Ennist. M. Allred), 2:18.82.
100 backstroke: 1) M. Boysen, 1:07.22; 5) Farmer, 1:19.17; 7) Stinson, 1:21.68.
100 breaststroke: 1) B. Allred, 1:19.66; 4) Cook, 1:23.40; 11) Rudd, 1:39.88.
400 freestyle relay: 1) Cody (M. Boysen, Hopkin, Rosenbaum, A. Boysen), 4:06.76; 4) Cody (Stinson, M. Allred, Ennist, Farmer), 5:05.63.
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