WESTMONT, Ill. (WTVO/WQRF)–Rockford has a new state champion in the swimming pool. Rockford East senior Camden Taylor is the guy.
The 6-9 Taylor is a generational swimmer. He showed that a couple weeks ago when he finished claiming every NIC-10 record in every individual swimming event. Saturday he came up big again at the IHSA swimming and diving meet.
Taylor competed in two events. First was the 200 freestyle. He had the second best time coming into the finals. He started great and led almost the entire race, but Champaign Central’s Noah Miller passed him up in the final 25 yards. Taylor settled for second place by 17 hundredths of a second.
2-and-a-half hours later it was time for Taylor’s second and final event, the 100 freestyle, his best event. He had the top time coming into the finals. Taylor started clean, took the lead from the start, and he never gave it up.
He claimed the state championship. Even more impressively was the fact he set a new state record with a time of 43.72 seconds. That beat by one-hundredth of a second the former record which had been held by Ryan Held of Springfield. Held later went on to compete in the 2016 Olympics.
To view video of Taylor’s races and to see his reaction to his win and record, watch the media player above.
