Raziano regains health, speed

Sprinter helps Knights snap skid, eye counties

By: Justin Feil
   Jason Raziano wished he could have made the Pirate Invitational and the West Windsor-Plainsboro North boys’ meet against Hopewell Valley.
   "I had a 103- or 104-degree fever all weekend," said Raziano, a WW-P North sophomore. "I was upset I had to miss the Pirate and Hopewell Valley."
   His Knight teammates wished he’d been feeling better as well. Last week, they lost to Hopewell, then fell to Colonial Valley Conference frontrunner Lawrence before snapping a three-meet losing streak with a 100-70 win over Hamilton on Tuesday. The boys improved to 6-5 with the win while the North girls also won to improve to 5-5.
   "It was all right," said Raziano, who won the 200 individual medley for one of two individual wins for the Knights Tuesday. "I’m still recovering from a week off. Since I missed a week of training, I’m not in my best shape. I’m working really hard. I’m going to practice so I can be all I can for counties."
   Raziano and the Knights were scheduled to end their CVC regular season against Hightstown on Thursday and have a week to prepare until the Mercer County Championship preliminaries. Boys begin Thursday at Lawrence High with the girls swimming preliminaries a week from today. Finals are Saturday, Feb. 5, and Raziano, who finished in the Top 12 in the 50 and 100 freestyle races last year as a freshman, hopes to be there again.
   "I have a good idea about how my competition is and what I need to do to perform well," Raziano said. "I was pleased (last year). I feel I want to do better. I have a year of high school under me and I feel more prepared."
   Raziano will also team with three Knights for the 200 and 400 free relays, and the success of them is something in which he plays an integral role.
   "He’s won almost all the 50s and 100s he’s been in," said North coach Tiffany Brennan. "He’s close to both school records. He had to miss the Pirate Invitational and that was tough. He’s our fastest sprinter.
   "He’s gotten faster as the season goes on. He should make the finals in both at counties, but those are such competitive events. Every high school boys wants to be a sprinter."
   Not all of them can be as fast as Raziano, who’s two seconds faster than the Knights’ next fastest 100 freestyler. Raziano got an early start in the sport. He has been swimming since he was 5 years old.
   "We had a beach house," he recalled of his swim roots. "My parents wanted to make sure I could swim before we went there. I just loved it and have been swimming since then."
   From the outset, he swam year-round for a club team. This year is his first with Eastern Express, and he’s finding the benefits of his new club include improving what have long been his favorite strokes.
   "Up until recently, I’ve been a real 50 guy," Raziano said. "Now I’m improving a lot more in the 100. My 100 is getting a lot better — training with Express is helping."
   Every hundredth of a second counts, particularly for the Knights who have had more than their share of narrowly contested meets. North has lost to Notre Dame by four points and Hopewell by just 10 this season. That’s what made Tuesday’s big win over Hamilton so unique this season.
   "We needed something like that," said Brennan, who juggled her usual lineup to give her teams a chance to swim some different events. "We’ve had a lot of close ones. We were close to Hopewell Valley and we didn’t have our best sprinter. We lost to Notre Dame by a little and had some disqualifications, so we shouldn’t have lost that. We’ve had a lot of close ones.
   "Some of the boys were talking that they were 11-3 last year and only 6-5 this year, but they’re swimming faster times. We graduated a lot of talent and everyone as a whole is swimming faster. We’ve improved a lot, but so have other teams."
   Raziano is hoping that he returns to top form by counties. He’d like to be at his best to live up to the high standards that he’s set and continue setting the sprint pace though he’s just a sophomore.
   "I guess it’s a tough role," Raziano said. "You have to lead the team. You have to live up to the position."
   Raziano has established himself as a team leader both in individual and relay races, and he’s hoping that his sprint speed can help the Knight relays swim a bit faster as they look to make the county finals.
   "Our relays are pretty good," Raziano said. "If we all swim well, our best times, we have a chance of placing. Princeton, West Windsor South and Lawrence are really good though. The competition helps get me better."
   The Knights’ anchor leg swimmer has been quite a finisher this year. He came into his second season with the WW-P North boys’ team knowing he’d be one of the top swimmers, one counted on to score big points as part of a talented sophomore class.
   "It’s different this year," he said. "Everyone’s improving. We lost a lot of seniors. We lost (current Rutgers University freshman) Larry Rosa. We all had to step it up.
   "We’re improving. It’s a little disappointing to be 6-5, but our grade will be pretty good in a couple years. We have eight or nine (sophomores) and they all have good potential and are going to start doing club year-round. We should be really good."
   Raziano has found himself getting stronger and faster every year and expects that to continue. He is a big believer in the benefits of swimming year-round.
   "You can always tell (who does)," he said. "They always have a lot more training and endurance."
   It’s paid off for Jason Raziano, a young leader of the Knight sprinters. In fact, the only thing seemingly capable of slowing him is his recent fever. And now that he’s on the road to recovery, he’s looking to place highly along with the Knight relays at the Mercer County Championships.