The End

So this isn't going to be a swimming post for the first time ever!! And it will be the last post ever!! If you are wondering why I am even writing this is because this entire year has been an assignment. For my honors english class we have had to wright a specific amount of posts all year. So for this last but not least post I would like to take some time and reflect on what not only I have learned but what you may have learned about me this year.
To begin I would like to say the my first post was horrible. I couldn't spell or type for my life and I had no idea. I had no idea how you write grammatically correct sentences but who cares about the small things. Thinking back and reflecting on my writing I see how small my world was: swimming, food, sleep, repeat, with a little bit of school stuffed somewhere in that zone. Not saying its a bad thing but I do believe I have grown since that first post of my blog. There is not way I could have know there were other people out in the world who I could interact with (I am a swimmer after all). I had not a care in the world and I loved it. But I think that though out my posts I started to think wider and wider because of not only the people I've met but the places I've been and the things I've been able to do at those places. At the beginning of the year I just kind of wrote ever day off like a check off of a calendar, ever meet off like it was nothing. But after going to compete in Texas at Sectionals, I am not sure I would even remotely do that anymore. Not everybody gets to go to something even half as big as sectionals if they qualify for it, and I am deeply indebted to: my parents, coaches, and my friends. they have gotten my this far, they have helped me grow. Now I want to show you guys that I actually have grown.

So to leave this off I would like to say goodbye. To tell the truth the hardest thing for me do do is write what is on my mind so to say another goodbye one of my visiting "inner demons" I will leave you with an article of Hunter S. Thompson's last words here.

Photo courtesy of Zazzle.com  

How to build a cake

Cakes are great right? They are used to celebrate great things like birthdays and weddings but what if they symbolized something deeper? The first thing you need to do to make a cake is to get the right kitchen. Then, you need to go out and buy all of the whole and organic ingredients and keep them together. After you do that you have to actually put all the ingredients together correctly and put them in the oven, but not just any oven, it has to be large enough and heated to the right temperature for your cake. Then you take the cake out when the time is right and wait for it to cool, if you don't do this right your entire cake will fall or implode. Then you decorate it with all the right toppings and creams so that after you cool it, you can eat it right away.

Photo courtesy of Cake boss.com

Now your wondering why I am talking about cakes, and not its not cause I am hungry (I am) but its because a building cake is like swimming to a T. We need the right kind of pool to swim in with just the right coaches and staff with the right amount of choline. Then we need to train and train ( this is the baking ) and then train some more. Once a meet comes up is when you start to add your toppings. racing is the cooling of the cake and eating it is the winning part. There are analogies for everything but cake fits swimming just for its special features and because they taste good. My coach has been writing an article on just this same thing for a couple of weeks now and its really interesting. Nobody else could have thought of it that way but he is right. There are times and people when you can't find the right ingredients and your cake comes out lopsided but thats ok because you can just start again which is a skill I think people should start to learn for them selves. I don't know when he will finally post his article but you can probably find it on this page.

Swimming and the Attitude

So you probably heard that micheal phelps got "sidelined" by USA swimming for drinking and driving... maybe not but what you might not have heard of was how he made his come back. To sum it all up he essentially had a eye opening experience at a alcohol rehabilitation centre. The first time anyone saw him since the day he got arrested was at a big meet that happened not to long ago. He showed up in a full beard (kind of protesting that he didn't need to train for this meet... he won by the way). He was really an amazing person and definitely showed he could be a great guy.

Photo Courtesy of wtaq.com

This is a story that most swimmers could go though. We are not the nicest breed (might be the chlorine, I don't know) but we have a lot of heart. We have the heart to not just stop when we've won but to keep going because we know we haven't really won yet. Nobody has, and nobody ever win because life is to short to win everything. If someone not helps us get to a place of peace ( not just telling us how but showing us) we can be really nice people. We can do that for one another in our swimming community because almost all of us have the same sarcastic personality. We know one another, not personally, but just by being and competing at a swim meet really shows who you are. "Show you hot you drive and I will show you who you are." Thats a great quote from my favorite movie, Fast 5. It not only shows that people can know each other from being together but by being around one another.

Getting back into it

Taking time off of swimming is hard. Those first few weeks back are hard. Its is the hardest time of the year (for me at least). Unless you work out during that time you loose all feeling for the water. Instead of swimmings you sink and it feels like you got hit by a train. Over the last 5 years you know hot many breaks I've had from swimming? 3. I have taken 3 total weeks off of swimming in the last five years. It is literally the worst thing for a swimmer to do. We loose all of our muscle and there is nothing we can do about it. We loose our feel for the water and there is also nothing we can do about it. It's not like we can just move back and forth in a hot tub or something you actually have to be pulling your body weight. We can go to the gym and lift weights, or go biking for hours on end and we will either build to much or not enough muscle to keep us in shape. While yes that seems like a hard thing to do, its all us swimmers can think about. We don't really have a lot of friends because we are always in the pool and what ever true friends we have are at the pool. So when we are taken or walk away from the pool (or any chlorine for that matter) we loose our selves. But breaks aren't all that bad... you get some time off and you get a life (... kind of). You get to sleep and catch up on homework that you have been putting off until the last nigh and you get to eat like never before (Micheal phelps would still beat you at eating on his bad day) because eating is the most important part of a workout. It's amazing really how great it feels until you get back in and it all come rushing back to you like never before and you wish you could have gone to swim at least once while you were away from your pool.

Photo Courtesy of Swimmingscience.com

After Sectionals

So that was interesting... I really have no idea what happened the last five days except that I swam and slept for all of it. (not to mention eating) The first day I had the 1000 free, It wasn't great but not bad. The second day was the best though, I had the 200 back where I made it into finals and finished 24th with a bunch of 17 and 18 year olds. I also made my first SCS cut which I talked about in a few posts ago. The third day was ok, I just had the 200 free, not my best event but I did get a best time. The fourth day was a little better, I had the 100 back and the 500 free (the exact order of events I swam at high school state) and I did pretty well. The very last day, today, I swam the mile. The longest even there is and definitely the hardest. The mile is not something to be taken lightly, if someone wants you to swim it protest harshly.

My team mates also did awesome too. One of my team mates, Katie Hale also made it back in one of her events, the 100 back. She was only at the meet for three days though because those were the days her events were on. My other team mate, Alandra McDowell did amazing as well. She unfortunately did not make it back but I believe that both of these girls could have really won it all.

Photo courtesy of 7hillscanvass.com

But thats not all... theres more do do in Texas than just swim. You can eat some darn good cow too. I really have never seen so many steakhouses on one street before in my entire life. There are some local restaurants that are awesome. They sell all kinds of stuff. This one place we went to (it was definitely just a one time thing) sold steaks practically floating in pounds of butter. It was pretty gross afterward but it was an experience that we all got to share. My coach the other families and some other people from Utah. All of us except for our coach agreed we would never go back there.

Like I have said before, if you want to see exactly how I did you can look it up on Meet Mobile and search my name with park city swimming with will also lead you to the ladies that went with me.

First day of sectionals

The first day of sectional was completely awesome. I woke up am got on a plane by the time normally I would be getting ready for school. (This was much better than that) That two hour plane ride really took a tole on me though. I was energetic when I got on so sitting there for two hours was impossible. Everything started to hurt cause it was cramping up and the only thing I could do was change how I was sitting. I was pretty glad though the guy next to me was asleep most of the time though. He didn't have to witness me massaging my body cause those seats are so small. I mean, I am a big person. I am not wide or anything just the amount of mass compared to the amount of body there is ridiculous. Personally I am way to big for those seats but that is besides the point. After we got off the plane we went strait to the hotel and I fell asleep.This day was just a warmup day though so I didn't actually have to race but it feels like your going to with all the anticipation.

Photo courtesy of kevindoak.com

There is no other way to say this but the pool is awesome. It was a 50 meter pool divided in half to make two 25 yard pools on either side with starting blocks and finishing walls of their own. The pool was lowered about a foot so getting out put me on quite the struggle bus. The entire pool bottom was lined with really bright lights so there was never going to be a dark spot in the pool. The pool also have a divided lane marker on the bottom of the pool at the 15 meter mark so that you knew when to come up off of each wall and not get disqualified. The divided of the pool was a bulk head that only went down part way so that you could swim under it and so that water can be equal on both sides. There was another pool to the side with a dive tank that was used for warm up and cool down after races. But the stands were the biggest thing. There were probably close to a thousand seats on the racing side of the pool area raised up about 12 feet to look over the pool.

I don't know how the rest of the meet is going to go but I plan to find out. If you want to see how I am doing you can get the app I recommended earlier called Meet Mobile.

How I feel now.

There is a joke out there that says, "if i had one dying wish I would wish to go to a swim meet because they take forever" and they do they totally do. Swim meets aren't just swimming your best and getting a new best time and all of that. Swim meets are a time for you to show what you are made of to other teams and other team mates. They are a time when you get to show your coach and your parents if what they have been providing to you has really done anything or if it was just a waste of time.

No matter the meet I always try my best. Sometimes its not good enough but I am trying my best all the same. I really have expectations when I go into most of my races. I like to do good, sure, but I don't like setting a goal or and time that I have to reach right before I swim because if you don't make it you just feel bad about yourself. That is why at big meets you can really see this about me. I am not exited for my races, I am not really until 15 minutes before and I definitely Don't want to be there.

But when that 15 minute mark comes... be ready. I have given 14 hours per every week in the pool and even more outside training for this moment when I get to show you what I am really made of. I don't expect much out of my swims because I already have people doing that for me. I don't mean I pay them or tell them to do it. They are the people who train me, raise me, and help me everyday to see what I can really put myself into.

To those people to doubt, I am really whenever you are to gear up and race. I will stand fast and try as hard as I can whenever I can.