A local youth swimming organization picked up a big honor last month — a top-100 ranking from the American Swimming Coaches Association.

Ad Astra Area Aquatics’ 12-and-under age group was ranked No. 23 in the 2022 national rankings — the only team from Kansas to finish in the top 100. It’s the highest ranking ever for Ad Astra, which finished at No. 93 in last year’s rankings.

Ad Astra was founded in 2010 by husband-and-wife team Patrick Norman and Katie Price, who serve as coaches for the program.

“I think it’s a real testament to the formula we’ve created in the program,” Norman said. He added that “Katie deserves a great deal of recognition” because she played a major role in helping the swimmers grow.

“They’re all homegrown,” Norman said of the program’s participants. “They’ve been swimming since a very young age and have been developed through our program.”

Ad Astra’s 12-and-under team ranked higher than teams from Chicago, Dallas, New York City and other big cities. Norman said he thought the program’s size helped it compete at a high level. There are 70 swimmers in the 12-and-under program.

“I think the biggest thing that helped us was our numbers,” Norman said. “Going all the way back to the pandemic, there weren’t a lot of activities because of everything going around. And through that period and into the last couple of years, their hard work and dedication to the sport really paid off.”

Norman expects the program’s enrollment to continue growing this summer. As of June 1, across all of Ad Astra’s age levels, there were about 200 swimmers signed up, Norman said.

Individual swimmers for Ad Astra are getting attention, as well. Lucy Velte, who is now 13 and attends West Middle School, competed in the 12-and-under nationals and had a big performance. She finished first in her age group in both the 50-meter backstroke (26.01) and 100-meter backstroke (56.52).

“Lucy not only has what some may define as talent or natural ability,” Norman said. “She also has a tremendous work ethic and is a great teammate and leader — characteristics coaches in any sport covet in their athletes.”

Norman said he hoped milestone finishes like that would inspire even more young swimmers to try to win meets and break records with the Ad Astra program.

“We’re starting to see some of our younger swimmers start to say, ‘Hey, maybe I can break a record or I can be the one who sets the record for the Kansas area,’ and it’s kind of had that snowball effect,” Norman said. “Based on our size, we can stay at least in the top 100.”