Noah Aube spends morning, afternoon and night in the swimming pool to get an edge.
From 5 a.m. workouts to mid-afternoon high school practices to late-night laps at the Y, Aube is constantly in the pool during high school swimming season. The Cony High School junior doesn’t take much of a break during the other eight months of the year, either.
First Team
200 free: Alex Bevier, Lawrence
200 IM: Ben Thibert, Messalonskee
50 free: Ben Thibert, Messalonskee
100 fly: Emmett deMaynadier, Waterville
100 free: Noah Aube, Cony
500 free: Noah Aube, Cony
100 back: Ben Thibert, Messalonskee
100 breast: Alex Bevier, Lawrence
200 free relay: Cony (Noah Aube, Dakota Douglas, Dylan Tudeen, Logan Testerman)
200 medley relay: Messalonskee (Ben Thibert, Tayler Croft, Daeghan Elkin, Griffin Burns)
400 free relay: Cony (Noah Aube, Dakota Douglas, Bradley Beeckel, Logan Testerman)
Second Team
200 free: Noah Aube, Cony
200 IM: Noah Aube, Cony
50 free: Noah Aube, Cony
100 fly: Ben Thibert, Messalonskee
100 free: Ben Thibert, Messalonskee
500 free: Alex Bevier, Lawrence
100 back: Noah Aube, Cony
100 breast: Ben Thibert, Messalonskee
200 free relay: Messalonskee (Spencer DeWitt, Ben Thibert, Daeghan Elkin, Kyle Perkins)
200 medley relay: Waterville (Spencer Jones, John Reisert, Alan Baez, Emmett deMaynadier)
400 free relay: Messalonskee (Kyle Perkins, Griffin Burns, Daeghan Elkin, Ben Thibert)
“He worked hard in the offseason. He put in a lot of double and triple practices,” Cony coach Jon Millett said.
“I definitely swam a lot of yards this year,” he said. “I worked a lot on pace in both my 200 and 500 and that really helped.”
It helped Aube defend his Kennebec Valley Athletic Conference championships in both those events and place in the top 10 at the state championship meet in both, as well. For those accomplishments, Aube has been named the Kennebec Journal Boys Swimmer of the Year for the second consecutive year.
Aube may have felt too strong for the KVAC 200 freestyle, his most dramatic race of the season.
“I was ahead for the first half of it. I think I took in out a little too hard because I got a little tired and my turns were bad,” Aube said.
Though he was losing steam, Aube managed to hold off Lewiston’s Mathew Charest at the finish by .15 of a second.
“Spending as much time in the pool as I did helped,” Aube said. “Every second counts or, in that case, every 10th of a second counts.”
Aube won the 500 freestyle by a much more comfortable margin, 21 seconds. He went on to finish seventh in the 200 and sixth in the 500 at states, improving on his 200 time by nearly a second and his 500 performance by nearly 10 seconds.
“At KVACs, the times weren’t quite where I expected to be, but I was pleased at states,” said Aube, who also led the Rams to top 10 finishes in two relay events.
He also became even more ubiquitous in Cony’s record book by setting new 100 freestyle and 200 IM marks while eclipsing his own records in the 200 and 500 freestyle.
No one was more shocked than Aube when he set the 200 IM standard (2:08.93) at an early-season meet against Erskine Academy.
“I really didn’t think about the record, but I still pushed myself. I was surprised (to break it). I usually know when I’m close but I didn’t in that race,” he said.
It was a rare miscalculation for Aube, a regular on Cony’s honor roll whose goal is to go to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. But then, he is a relative newcomer to the sport.
He didn’t start swimming competitively until four years ago and still has a lot to learn. But he does possess at least one important quality that can’t be taught.
“He’s an outstanding competitor,” Millett said. “He shows up to swim.”
Randy Whitehouse — 621-5638
rwhitehouse@mainetoday.com
Twitter: @RAWmaterial33
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