ATWATER — Pitman High swimmer Brittany Funk began Thursday morning on a bad note.

Her nose started bleeding.

The junior had been sick, and the incident wrecked her warm-up time before the Central California Championships at Buhach Colony High. However, Funk regained her focus and clocked in an impressive 100-yard butterfly time of 1 minute, 2 seconds, more than enough for first place and one of the top five times in league meet history.

“It motivated me,” Funk said about her nosebleed. “I didn’t want anything to stop me.”

She was the lone local swimmer to win an individual event on Thursday. In fact, she won two events. Her other victory was in the 100-yard backstroke, in which she finished with a time of 1:03.95, just .23 seconds ahead of runner-up Jacy Gustafson of Turlock High. Funk’s efforts helped her Pride to a second-place showing in the girls competition with 483 points, 111 behind winner Merced High.

The Bears also won the boys team title, beating runner-up Atwater High by 128.5 points.

“I thought she went out strong,” Pitman girls coach Michaela Solario said about Funk’s butterfly triumph. “Her arms were moving, her legs were moving. She had the advantage the whole time. I told her to give it her all and she did it.”

With two strong performances by Gustafson in the butterfly and backstroke events, the Turlock girls finished third with 356 points. With few top three performances, the Turlock and Pitman boys team wrapped up the season at the bottom of the league standings at fifth and sixth, respectively.

The Pitman girls team also had impressive swims from Kamarin Waite, who took second in the 200 individual medley with a time of 2:26.52, and Leanna Jasek-Rysdahl, who raced to a butterfly time of 1:05.91 to take third.

Turlock’s Gustafson also took second in the 100 freestyle after finishing in 58.8 seconds. To wrap up the Bulldogs’ day, Rebekah Groteguth took third in the 50 freestyle and Kristine Groteguth also placed third in the 500 freestyle.

“We were setting up to have good times in today’s meet,” Turlock coach Sonja Raynes said afterward.

Her Turlock boys finished with two notable showings in Davis Woods’ third-place finish in the 100 butterfly and Neil Wraske’s third-place run in the 100 backstroke. Woods also captured the boys diving title with 409.35 points to finish ahead of teammate Cody Huntington, the runner-up.

For girls diving, Turlock’s Leilani Almeida captured second place with 236.75 points.

Next up for the local swimmers is the Sac-Joaquin Section Meet, with the trials on May 12-13 and the final on May 14, as both events take place at Tokay High.

To contact Chhun Sun, e-mail csun@turlockjournal.com or call 634-9141 ext. 2041.