Olympics Swimming

Well, watching all this Olympic swimming every night has gotten me itching to be back in the water. My last competetive race was about 5 years ago. I can't believe it's been that long. For some reason, swimming came very natural to me and I started competing at around age 5 or 6 on the Guntersville Swim Team. I swam competitively up until I was 18 (the oldest you could be on that team). I also was an assitant coach while lifeguarding for the last two years. I remember when there was a time that I dreamed of being on the U.S. Olympic Swim Team. I was by no means a Micheal Phelps, though, so that was a stretch. I only swam during the summer and never year-round like some teams, so even trying to swim for college could've been a stretch. I know I also wouldn't have been cut out for that crazy schedule Phelps has....did y'all see that, literally an all-day ordeal from 6:30AM to 11:00PM, non-stop! He is the real deal. And I mean I was good at one stroke, well excelled at one, the others I just knew how to do. He can do it all! If you can't tell, I'm amazed.

Anyway, like I said it all makes me miss swimming. Check out these old pictures I found.

And here's one of my relay team that got the bronze at State one year

Those were when I was older. The ones I have from when I was little, like 8 or 10 years old when I won state in breast stroke are in a frame with the medal. It was such a family event. My parents had what they call heat books which show what heat each swimmer is in and what their entry times are. My parents and I would look it over and see what seed I was as well as figure out who my biggest competition would be (usually we already knew because I had swam against them before at some point). Then my parents would be somehwere along the side of the pool where the bleechers were or if it was a local meet, they would be at the end of the pool positioned right at the end of my lane to cheer me on. Even though they had never swam competitively before, they knew when I had a good start/dive, a good turn, or a good time. It became a lifestyle for us. No sport ever made me get those little butterflies in my stomach like walking up to the blocks and hearing that start buzzer for a race. The water always felt like a part of me. I can't really explain it well, but I am going to find a way to get back into a lap pool and get back in swimming shape.

There's this cool thing that Auburn University has called the Masters Swimming where they have competitive swimming for older ages. I'll have to do some more looking into it, but that would be so exicting for me. Oh well, enough rambling about swimming, just thought I'd share my craving.