Junior Swim captain Aiden Pagnucci is a varsity swimmer for the high school’s boys swim and dive team. He has been swimming for 12 years in total, with three of them being for Superior. 

Pagnucci started swimming back when he was five years old, he was influenced by always being surrounded by water with his older brother swimming, his mom being a swim instructor, and his dad growing up on a lake and also loving the water. In his eyes, competitive swimming just made sense for him to do.  

Overall Pagnucci’s season has been very productive and he’s doing great, and he’s improved a lot since last season. He’s been dropping time from his events, also getting a lifetime best very early on in the season, and he’s been making the podium in lots of his events. He’s been doing very well as a captain this season too. 

“His family is the type of people to help and take charge. It’s in his nature to lead and to help, and a good leader listens to what people have to say, and he does exactly that.” Bill Punyko, head swimming coach,  said. He also has broken one of the high school records this year.

This season Pagnucci broke Superiors high school’s 100 back stroke record. It was originally set in 1996 by Kurt De Kiep at 57.51 seconds, Pagnucci broke it by 57.21 seconds in Rock Ridge on Jan. 10, 2026. Pagnucci always wanted to break this record when he started to swim for high school. Going to Rock Ridge he originally wanted to beat a specific opponent at the 100 backstroke event, Pagnucci got second place against him in the beginning of the season and knew that he would be going against him again later in the season. 

The swimmer he was going to go against got injured before the meet, so Pagnucci promptly changed his mindset and decided that that meet would be the meet where he finally broke the record. He walked up to Punyko and told him that he was going to break the record, then went to the start area. After 30 years of the record being unchanged Pagnucci broke it by .30 seconds, making a new record. 

“I’m always excited when records are broken, and I love watching people’s achievements, but that record was especially special to watch because of how long it was up for before Aiden broke it” Punyko said. 

“Mindset is everything with swimming”, Pagnucci said, as to what helped him break the record.

As the regular season is finishing up for swimming, Punyko is expecting Pagnucci to have a strong finish to the season, and is looking forward to seeing what will happen during regionals and then next season.