POULSBO — In times like Thursday night when the North Kitsap swim team hosted Stadium, the old adage “records are made to be broken” resounded in truth.

For the second time this season, North’s tight-knit squad broke a school record as the 400M freestyle relay team darted past the 4:07.05 record set in 2002. North’s 2006 squad — Whitney Glebe, Kathryn Parker, Natalie Fritsch and Stephanie Longmate — swam a time of 4:06.82, earning their spot in the NK record books.

When North hosted Mount Tahoma in September, NK’s 200 free relay team — featuring Glebe, Parker, Longmate and Ingrid Reeves — bested the school record by just under a second.

“It was really exciting, very, very, very exciting,” Fritsch said, searching for the words to describe her first record-breaking feeling Thursday night.

Excitement abounded throughout the North Kitsap pool as Stadium brought a loudly encouraging squad whose cheering, which matched with that of the Vikings, created a near-deafening atmosphere at times. But the final event of the meet — the 400 free relay — was the culmination of it all.

“The high point for the entire team was the record-breaking relay,” said NK junior Talitha Aban, noting that this year’s success has been a product of intensity in practice and camaraderie in the pool. “We’re all really close after being together for so many years, and the workouts have gotten harder. The workouts we’re doing everyday are the workouts we would do during a hard day last year.”

Despite finishing the meet with 118-53 point total in favor of Stadium, the Vikings’ hard work continues to pay off in the form of best times, district qualifying swims and, of course, breaking records.

Longmate was the only Viking who came touched in first place Thursday. In the second event of the day, Longmate utilized her freestyle, swimming to first place with a time of 2:04.54, eight seconds ahead of the competition. Then, later in the meet, Longmate backstroked to a 1:06.54 finish, 10 seconds ahead of the field.

Longmate is one of seven Vikings who have hit qualifying marks for the West Central District meet which will be October 26-28 at Rogers High School pool in Puyallup.

Among 22 personal best times for the Vikings Thursday, Fritsch and Brittany McKenzie swam their best in the 500 free and 100 breastroke, respectively, to become North’s latest qualifiers. And their improvement was astounding as Fritsch dropped 15 seconds of her best time, while McKenzie improved by three seconds.

“We’re at the point where we’ve got to start looking at what events girls really want to swim for the district meet,” said coach Greg Braun. “It’s coming down to crunch time.”

The Vikings will host Foss in their last meet of the season at 3 p.m. Oct. 17, then those qualified will move into the postseason. With only a handful of state-hopeful events, Braun said the team’s focus on improvement will remain.

“Having (the girls) end the season on a best swim would be the ultimate goal and then let things fall where they may,” he said.

The postseason begins with Narrows League trials Oct. 20 at South Kitsap, followed by districts the next week.