Someone important once said that "A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step."

For the women's swimming and diving team, several steps were taken this weekend at the Ivy Championships to bring home the conference title in the future.

The Crimson had hopes of winning the championship title this year, but finished a respectable third with 656.5 points. Princeton captured the victory with 794 points, followed closely by Brown at 747 points. Yale took the fourth place position--well behind the top three schools--with 466.5 points, while the rest of the league followed behind the Bulldogs.

The journey to the top of the Ivy League wasn't completed this year, but the team has bounded toward that goal for the next few seasons with several breakthrough performances.

"We had high expectations going into the weekend," said senior co-captain Sue Machorek. "We wanted to win the meet, but we aren't disappointed because we turned in solid performances and stuck right with Princeton and Brown."

While the team was not able to fulfill its aspirations, it did have several standout performances that kept it in the running for the title. In fact, the team boasts four swimmers that made the finals in all three of their events.

Freshman Lovisa Gustafsson led the pack, winning the Ivy title for the 1650-yard freestyle, the most grueling swimming event. Swimming with a small lead over Princeton's Tara Martin, Gustafsson found herself even with only one lap to go in the 66-lap race. She managed to out-touch Martin by a mere six hundredths of a second, finishing in 16:48.62 over Martin's 16:48.68.

"Starting the last session with Lovisa's swim gave the team so much momentum," said co-captain Corie Calfee. "Any time a mile comes down to a few hundredths, it's going to be exciting. And the way she stuck with the race and pushed herself proved to the rest of us that even if we were tired we could still swim well."