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

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.

Preparing for even Bigger Meets

After high school state and regular state you would think the season would be done and there is nothing left to do. I have qualified to go to a sectional meet in austin in a few weeks that will be the biggest meet I have ever been to. There are different "stages" in swimming that kind of compare you to other swimmers and see what you go for next. State is actually one of the lower ones on this list though.

-It starts with a qualifying meet which is really just swimming a event for the first time.
-Then there is the Beehive meet which is for the people who don't go to state.
- Of course state is after that.
-The first big meet is Far westerns, hundreds of people from western states attend.
-Zones is the next one, this is like far westerns but more selective.
-Senior Zones are a little harder. (I never went just cause.)
-Sectionals is the first meet where olympians might attend. (This is the one I qualified for)
-SCS is the next.
-Both junior and regular nationals.
-And last (of the normal meets) olympic trials.

Sectionals will really be interesting because I have no idea what to expect. In the past I knew who or what teams what teams would be there but this time teams from anywhere can buy their way into a different regions meet. I do not think it will really change how I swim except for the for the new stress. I really have no idea what to expect, there could be any kind of weather of water conditions. Even though the pool in indoors it really puts a downer on your day if its raining. What I am most scared to see are the walls. I do not know it where is a ledge or it it just going up and the ends of the pools. Or if the backstroke bars are higher or lower of if the touch pad is big or small. I have spent quite some time looking online but they only have details about the other sectional pool in Seattle. I would guess it looks quite like if though so the meet is going to be interesting!

Photo courtesy of Swim Center

Losing part of a family

Being with people, not necessarily talking to them just being with them connects people. It makes feel a sense of protection over the other where if there were to be a fight they would always side with you. This I feel in very prominent on the swim team. We don't all talk to each other but we all share the same love for swimming and that we all either like the social part of just training for something later. I do not know how other sports are with this but even after swimming everyone are still friends because for just that reason. Sure, there are some people you may not care for but that doesn't affect your relationship with anyone else.

Photo courtesy of Twitter.

I will sure miss all of those swimmers on our team who only do high school. I do believe that they will miss the team as well but I guess we will see next year when the year starts again. I would like to say that you guys all did great and you all tried you best however far you got. I am really proud that I was on the same team as all of you guys. It really has been a pleasure and if you want to come back next year or the year after that is totally cool with me.
 I would like to invite anyone back or even for the first time onto the team. Wether you feel like joining the age group team that goes all year we could really use you if you are in high school. There are so few older kids there are only, at one time, 14 of us.
You can check this page next year if you want any updates on the starting or meet schedule

How we roll at regions

A few years ago there was no way our team would have known they would win regions but now... its different. Now we have the best team in the state and there is nothing anyone can do to stop us. We won out of the 3A schools on both sides by at least a hundred points. All of our swimmers did terrifically and I personally couldn't have wished for a better team my freshman year. I believe our girls won all of their events and all relays. Which is great, last year we would've had loads of competition but the girls didn't even have to look back to know how far ahead they were. It was honestly so much fun watching them have their own fun and being a part of their training.

Photo courtesy of vancouversun.com 

The boys did awesome too. We won all the relays and we lost in one event which was totally fine cause we had nobody who really specialized in it. Even though we wished we had won all of the events we were kind of feeling bad because the other teams weren't getting any closer though out the meet to winning anything. But its alright they tried their best and get best times at that. I really to give congrats out to the swimmings of both of those teams.
We all raced our hardest and I personally did pretty well, we of course won our relays and I got first in the 200 free and second and the 500 free. If you want to see all of our swims you can get the free app Meet Mobile which has detailed scores on how everyone did. But don't be fooled we are just getting started with our achievements. I believe next week at state we will be able to bring the pain and get out there and race.

Leading up to Hight School State

The weeks before a big meet are the hardest part of a season. Everyone gets sick and everyone is sore. Usually grades drop and there is nothing we can really do to study harder. It is honestly the worst part of the season and there is nothing that you can do to change that. But you can just keep going and eventually you stop feeling a lot of the pain.

Picture courtesy of imarcade.com 

Some of us actually really like this time of the year though. Sure the homework isn't fun but being sore and sick can sometimes be really fun if it also leads up to a really good meet after. This whole thing is put up by our coaches by giving us less yards but making the faster. Its so super hard in the higher groups as we sprint for the last 30 minutes of practice. I can not think of one time where anyone truly said they liked the sets but there are good and bad days. It all just depends on if you are able to sprint everyday for an entire two weeks. In this process your immune system completely shuts down with no point of return until after the meet. Your body changes from staying healthy to making sure you can still walk.
This would sound like a nightmare for most people. They would never want to even get in the water if they knew they wouldn't feel good later. But for us we don't know what we would do without it. This time in the season is but a short bit out of the greatness in the year and we would not miss it for the world.
Of the entire season this would usually be the most expected time for people to drop out but its exactly the opposite if you don't come to even one practice it means you can't take the heat, and no one wants to have other people think they can't do what everyone else is doing. The beginning of the entire year is actually the time when people drop out the most because they don't know what swimming can do for you yet.

Why Can't Swimming Just Never End?

Winter Break is probably the worst part of high school swimming. Practice isn't mandatory so nobody comes. The pool just sits there... unused by hundreds of people. Our team consists of almost 70 people, only eight to nine showed up on any given day. Thats not even a seventh! Those few of us who did come are in great shape for the rest of the season. We are ready to go, just add water. Not those who didn't come, and now their all regretting it too.

Picture courtesy of Nevada state pool

Swimming is the one sport that even with three days off you could potentially ruin your entire season. After day your body forgets how to do specific things in each stroke correctly, within two days your body starts to lose muscle. Now take that bit of information and think about the effect of taking all of winter break off. I have only seen someone comeback from two weeks and do good or even better once. It was not very fun forcing myself to do stuff on land and I don't even know what exactly helped, swimming takes a lot of commitment but its worth it in the end. "Stay in shape and you'll stay on this team" thats the moto I came up with. Our coach can only take about twenty people total to state, two in each event. Our team isn't even worried about the other competitors, it's a race to see who can get their spot on the state team. Nobody will talk about it but everyone is thinking about just they will have the advantage over the other, weighing possibilities, and if your really lazy you'll find out just how slow you will have to go to get into the top six.
If you want to see just how much time we have till we are swimming at state click here.

Winning meets

Winning meets are probably the most awarding feeling ever. Sure you can win your event and feel great but being able to see that you contributed to something bigger than your self is even better. No one can take that away from you if they swim faster. You are a part of a team that can beat so many others, such as Park City High School. We are the focal point of 3A swimming in Utah. No other team from 3A has beaten us in the last three years. This is my first year on the team and I can already feel how much we will win by. Last year the girls won by over 100 points where as the boys won by seven points. As we did not lose any men for last year and gained six more, I say we have quite the chance to do it again on both sides.

Picture courtesy of Me

Not only are we rewarded by the other team but we are rewarded by each other. Something that other sports only dream about. Right as that final score comes up you won. You have helped you team show just how good they are. Cause its not about you in this instance. You represented all of park city with you sportsmanship and actions.You showed the parents, the other teams parents, and their swimmers that park city is a force to reckoned with.

Training the best team in the state

Park City High School is the best team in the state. We won for boys last year with eight boys. Our girls won by over 100 points. There were no senior boys last year, we only added on to the team and got better. We now have a swimmer in the top ten for the nation. We will be on the podium for every single event. This is all thanks to our coaches.

Mike is the greatest coach I have ever met as he is training three future olympians right now and they are all in high school. No body could deny that he is doing great at his job but his job is hard. He lives in salt lake and trains us at least five days a week. On tuesdays and thursdays we have morning practice at 5:15am. Then everyday he also stays after high school practice for the smaller kids which we also are able to stay and train with them, and just because they are small doesn't mean they are not fast cause they could beat most of the juniors and seniors.

Getting Ready for the Ultimate Goal

For football there is the Superbowl. For soccer there are the Cups. Every sport has an endpoint where exceedingly above average athletes compete to prove who has what it takes. For swimming there is the Olympics, and that is the ultimate dream for every single person on this planet. Sure you can say, "ya my team won the superbowl." Good for you and the 100 other players on your team. There's just something special about being able to say, "Hey, see that gold medal up there hanging on the mantle? I got that in the olympics!"

You race right along side your team mates, the ones you have trained thousands of hours with, and swimmers from completely different countries. The thrill of having millions of people watch you during and well after your race. I am not saying you'll be awesome just because you're famous (which you will be) but because you were lucky to be one of fifty people in the entire world to stand out. Swimming is the most watched sport in the olympics by 50% of all the people who watch it.

My Inaugural Meet of the season

My day usually starts out with a long shower and a protein smoothie, and then the real work gets done. I get mentally ready for another extremely long 6:30 am swim meet. Our warmup is about 30 minutes long but for me, at that time of the morning, I am still pretty much asleep. My first race in the 200 Freestyle, and it will be the hardest one of the day. There are over 400 swimmers at the pool and everyone is hyped and ready to go with zero races behind them and needing to win. My luck doesn't seem to be with me because I get stuck in the lane that the sun just happens to be shinning and I'm not wearing my tinted goggles. My race didn't go very well as you might imagine. Thankfully my first race is behind me and the fun really begins, there are so many people at this meet I have hours between my races and my friends are stuck with me the entire time.

The last two races of my day go pretty well. Not exactly what I would have asked for but its early in the season and I am still getting there.  We have about a 4-5 hour break so that every one can go home and sleep and then bright and early at 5:00 in the morning we get up again and do the same thing, just different races. This is probably my absolute favorite thing to do. This is what trains us so that we can reach the achievements that we dream about. Sure the sleep deprivation is hard, but I sure have fun with my friends in and out of the water.

What Most People Don't Know About Swimming...

When people look at swimmers in the water, like Olympic athletes, they think wow they work really hard. They don't even have a clue. They compare swimming to Football or Soccer, and sure those can be hard sports too with all the running, memorizing plays and getting slammed in the face with a ball. Well, just think of that times three.  Now it sounds quite a bit harder don't you think? Well it most definitely is! Competitive swimmers trains like no other and do workouts that no one would ever think swimmers would do.

Most high level swimmers train 7 days a week either in the pool or in the gym.  In addition to swimming 2 hours every day, on Tuesday's and Thursday's right after school I walk over to the gym where I work strength training for almost an hour. Then, right when I am done I drive to the pool where I work out with the rest of the team for another two hours, and about a quarter of that is running and core training. The entire time we're are in the water we work on strength, precision, skill, and team work. So while people think swimming is an individual sport, while it may be for some, you really have to work together to get practice done. You can see just how hard we work, go to this website.