SWIMMING

Spinks, a 1965 graduate of Decatur High School, joined the Lakeside-DeKalb coaching staff in 1977 as a swim coach and PE teacher where she left a legacy of success. She was an accomplished swimmer and diver at Decatur and also held high school records in basketball and softball. She kept hold of her competitive spirit as she began coaching at Lakeside.Spinks led the Lakeside girls to nine DeKalb County swimming championships during her tenure. Her first two county titles came in 1978 and 1979 and the Vikings won three straight from 1981 to 1983. In the final years of her coaching career, Spinks coached the Vikings to the county championships again from 1997 to 2002.Her success with the Vikings was also seen at the state level. Spinks won her first Girls Swimming State Championship at Lakeside in 1978, which defended coach Roxanne Dasch’s 1977 title. She coached the girls back to victory at the state championships in 1981 to add a second state title.Spinks also had success coaching the boys swimming team and led them to DeKalb County Championships in 1978, 1981 and 1988. Spinks retired in 2007.

Loisel, Class of 1972, won several state and county swimming championships throughout her career at Lakeside and earned the Viking Award during her senior year to close out her varsity career.As a sophomore, she won the 100-yard butterfly state championship with a state record time of 1:05.00, beating the previous record of 1:05.03. She won the 100-yard backstroke state championship again as a junior and as a senior she won a state title in the 100-yard backstroke. She was also on three medley relay state championship teams.Loisel also dominated in county championships where, in 1971, she won the 100-yard backstroke at the DeKalb championships. In 1972 she won both the 100-yard backstroke as well as the 100-yard butterfly.Loisel was asked by several universities, including the University of Georgia and South Carolina, to swim for their teams, but she ended up choosing Western Carolina University where she swam and was also a cheerleader for football and basketball. After graduation, she began teaching in Cobb County and taught first grade and kindergarten for 25 years before retiring in 2015.