THORNTON – And emotional Caroline Bricker couldn’t help but think about what she accomplished at the Class 4A girls swim meet.
 
She also couldn’t help but think of what she, and the rest of the Red-Tailed Hawks, can prove next year. Bricker had an outstanding championship session and broke two state records. The problem is she only gets to hang on to one. 
 
She took aim at the two-minute mark in the 200-yard individual medley and when she made her final touch at looked to the results board smiled when she a “1” as the first number of her time.
 
She finished in one minute, 59.37 seconds to break her own state record of 2:00.87 and become the first girl to ever swim the 4A 200 IM in under two minutes.
 
“Three times knowing I had this in me,” Bricker said. “It was definitely a goal to that again.”
 
It’s an indication that setting a record a year ago wasn’t good enough and what makes her a top-notch competitor is her constant desire to build on her previous success and continue to get better.
 
Perhaps even more important is her desire to lift her team as they enter every state swim meet with the ultimate goal of being the team that jumps in the pool hoisting the state championship trophy.
 
“It’s going to be such a motivating force for us next year,” Bricker said. “We’re all going to use it. We’re only losing one of our state swimmers and every single one of us who performed this weekend is going to use it not just next high school season, but the entire time building up to it.”
  She broke a second state record later in the night as she finished the 100 breastroke in 1:01.09, edging out Niwot’s Mary Codevilla’s preliminary time of 1:01.38.
 
The problem was Codevilla’s finals time was a quarter of a second faster than Bricker. It was a neck-and-neck race every step of the way, Codevilla just touched the wall sooner by the slightest of margins. But the competition was fun and Bricker was never going to shy away from the challenge of taking on one of the best swimmers in the state, regardless of classification. 
 
“She has such a fierce drive and she loves to race,” coach Kate Doane said. “Give her anybody and she’ll go hammer it down. She was out in front (of the 200 IM, but she was chasing the clock and she knew she needed to chase her time.”
 
Bricker also swam the third leg of the 200 medley relay team that finished second and anchored the 400 freestyle relay team that finished fifth. The Hawks finished fourth in the team standings as Heritage put together a dominant team performance to win its second straight team title.
 
That was the sight that she and the rest of the Hawks will remember until next winter. Bricker was a freshman on the Hawks’ state championship team in 2020 and remembers that feeling. She knows the program is capable of getting there again and has shown that she will happily do the work to help bring a title home.