For over four decades, the Wheat Ridge Piranhas Swim Club has been doing something bigger than swimming — building community, one lap at a time.
If you’ve ever stood on the pool deck at a Wheat Ridge Piranhas practice, you know the sound. Coaches and swimmers chanting together — “Chomp! Chomp! Chomp!” — a rallying cry that captures everything this club is about: energy, belonging, and lots of fun.
It started around 1981–82, when the City of Wheat Ridge launched a CARA Swim Program to give kids a chance to experience team swimming without the grind of five-days-a-week practices. As interest grew, families asked for more competition, and eventually the full-summer model won out — and the Wheat Ridge Piranhas Swim Team was born.
Anderson Pool — a modern, beautiful 8-lane facility — quickly became a point of pride in the Foothills Swimming Association. By 1987 the club hosted its first League Championship, and families like Eve and Roger Trengove poured years of volunteer energy into making it all work, watching their daughter Meg grow into a team veteran and later her son Tanner swim for the Piranhas too. Last year, the Piranhas hosted the 65th Annual FSA League Championship at Anderson.
That spirit of passing the torch is what keeps the Piranhas strong. Long-time board member Amy Storey didn’t just serve the club — she shaped how it runs, passing along the institutional knowledge that makes meets flow: including the critical volunteer role of heating, organizing swimmers into the right lanes and heats so everything runs smoothly. The Storey family is a perfect example of the Piranhas at their best — Amy’s family swam for the club and have since returned as coaches, carrying their love of the sport right back to the pool deck. After swimming for the Piranhas for 15 years, Erin Storey has now returned as a coach.
And the fun is very much by design. Fridays bring the doughnut fairy — a beloved weekly tradition swimmers look forward to all week. Home meets and practices get full themed treatment: Mardi Gras on the pool deck, “Anything But a Swim Cap” competitions, and whatever creative chaos the team dreams up next.
The parent-led volunteer board makes all of it happen — and they’re not just a committee, they’re friends. Parents who started out squinting into the sun on the side of the pool, jostling for a patch of shade, and ended up building something together. They meet at Rickoli’s Brewery to plan and strategize, and local Wheat Ridge businesses have become part of the team too — Stylus and Crate and Pietras Pizza have both helped fuel fundraising sales at meets, the kind of community support that makes this club feel like it truly belongs to the neighborhood.
Wheat Ridge is the Piranhas, and the Piranhas help make Wheat Ridge what it is — a place where neighbors show up for each other, kids grow up cheering each other on, and summers are measured in heat sheets, relay handoffs, and the echo of “Chomp! Chomp! Chomp!” off the water.
Ready to be part of it? Learn more and sign up at wrp.swimtopia.com.
