The relay meet
The relay meet was a “fun” meet. There were some silly relays and there were some non-standard relays. Seeding was done pretty randomly, so you didn’t know where to expect the fastest times to come from. And best of all, the two two relays in each heat got a pick from santa’s stash of candy, oranges or apples.
I made it perfectly clear after we didn’t make top two in our first relay, that I was just swimming for the candy bars.
The meet took a little over two hours from start to finish, which is really fast to swim five events. I have to say, DAM really puts together well run meets.
The stories of the meet.
I swam the backstroke for the 200 and 400 medley relay. I proved beyond a reasonable doubt that I am not the fastest backstroker on the team. Why this claim was ignored in the first place, I will never know. Brook’s medley relay team managed to beat ours by 5 one hundreth’s of a second. Brook was anchor and went into the race with a lead which she maintained against our faster 50 freestyler. Good for her, but she didn’t manage a candy bar out of it either.
Swimming next to me on the other side was the 1996 Olympic gold medalist in the 200 back. I think he got a candy bar, but since it was only a 50, I couldn’t tell how badly he had beat me, and no one bothered to tell me.
Now, in the 400 medley relay, I was lucky enough to swim right next to Brad Bridgewater, Mr. Gold Medalist, again. This time, I am heading down the pool for the 3rd length and about the halfway point I can see him pass me going the other direction on his 4th length. He beat me by over 25 yards on a 100 yard race. Thats another candy bar for him. We did manage to pull a candy bar 2nd place finish.
Now for the funny stuff. The 4×200 relay was the longest event there, and there were only 3 or 4 teams entered. The announcer of course made fun of everyone for wanting to swim this event, announced the event and told everyone they would have plenty of time for a bathroom break, called us all masochists, pointed out the relays were all male, and the girls were smart enough to take a break.
That was only the beginning. In the lane next to ours, one guy showed up. “Hey, you swimming the whole 800 by yourself?” “I hope not, there is the rest of the relay walking over.” This guy we were ribbing beat our fastest swimming who was leading off the relay this time around. So after the relay started, we were chatting with the rest of his relay, and they informed us that they weren’t swimming, they were just going to cheer #1 on until he finished his leg of the race, then walk away. So #1 is out there busting his ass, takes a close second, beats us, and the rest of the relay, good to their word, cheers his finish and walks away.
We were in a close 3rd with our second man took off. He quickly passed the first place team and gave our #3 a good lead. The #3 took that lead and turned it into over a lap lead, and our #1 starts telling me not to loose it, the other teams #4 is fast. So I take off well into the lead, with no one to pace off of. After the first 50, someone starts to catch up with me, so I start to pace off him as well as I can without pushing too hard, too early. At the 150, he has about half a body length lead and at this point I start going all out. I close the distance considerably, but at this point I have been focused one finishing my race, and not thinking about much else.
I slam my finish look up and Ken is standing there yelling at me that I am not done, I have another 50. The rest of the relay start yelling at me too. I start to go again, cussing, and I get the laughter. Apparently, this wasn’t even planned, Ken just thought he would be funny, and the other two guys on the relay caught on immediately and went to help the joke along. Brook was up in the stands and everyone is laughing, but the relay had convinced her too, because we had lapped the lane next to us, that I really did stop early. The head coach said “Looks like Ken will be swimming a 200 fly Monday for that one.”
I am a 200 freestyler. It is easily my strongest event and any fast 200 in practice or any race, I swim it the same way. When you are swimming a 500, it is easy to loose count. Even a 100 can be confusing at times because you are pretty much swimming all out, and if there is a big enough distraction, you have no idea how many flip turns you have made. My 200 on the other hand is a progression of 50s, no two 50s are the same, and you know whats next just from what you are doing now. I was in total shock that I was paying so little attention that I was able to skip part of the progression and miscount my 200. I am told it was quite the Kodak moment, and too the best of my knowledge, no one had a camera.
Two other mishaps that are kinda funny in the same race. Our lead guy got water in his goggles on the start, so he kicked on his back for a second and adjusted his goggles midrace. He still managed a faster time than me.
Our #2 guy comes to the end of his 150 and sticks his head up to see where he is in the 200. I was really worried he was going to stop because our #3 was already up on the blocks. How he figured out he wasn’t supposed to stop is beyond me, but he confirmed afterwards that he had miscounted and got ribbed not only from our team, but the relay next to us. #3 was Ken, so he can take just as well as give.