Glavich stepped off the podium only to return a few minutes later with three other members of Green Hope's 400 free relay team that won gold in 3:13.74. Glavich, the Tri-Nine boys swimmer of the year, led the Falcons to a NCHSAA 4-A East Regional Swimming title by winning each of the four races he participated in. The Falcons were dominant throughout as they won by 129 points over second-place Enloe.

And in order to win those races Glavich showed his stamina because he didn't have much time to rest between events.

"This has been the hardest year of training I've done in my life," said Glavich, who also won the 200 medley relay and 200 IM. "I don't mind doing back-to-back races because I think it gets me warmed up, which is probably why I did so well."

The same went for the Cary girls, who had each of their 12 swimmers score points to win a second consecutive regional championship.

"We had an awesome year last year, but we lost a lot of strong swimmers," Cary coach Erin Stevens said. "I had high expectations that we would do well, and I'm thrilled we're defending champs again."

The Imps were led by Victoria Mitchell, who also won four races to be one of the top individuals. Mitchell said she knew her team could win the regional after winning the first event of the day - the 200 medley relay - a full second ahead of conference rival Apex.

"Everyone was really excited after our first relay because we beat Apex after they beat us in the conference meet," Mitchell said. "We swam faster than we have all year so I think that helped our confidence a lot."

Stevens said Cary had plenty of swimmers who set new personal records.

"It's great when you have the whole team involved," she said.

The Cary (136, 6th), Apex (124, 9th) and Panther Creek (116.5, 10th) boys swim teams all notched top 10 efforts.

The girls side looked more like a Tri-Nine meet, with Apex (266.5, 2nd), Green Hope (226, 3rd) and Panther Creek (216, 4th) finishing in succession behind Cary. Middle Creek's girls (165, 6th) and Athens Drive (124, 10th) made for six of the top 10 coming from the Tri-Nine.