After another successful weekend of swim meets, improving the team's record to 4-0, Whitman Swimming now embarks on an important week of training before heading into Thanksgiving break. With no meets to prepare for this weekend, practices will be challenging to say the least. Any good habits that fell by the wayside over the past two weeks will be re-solidified between now and our winter training trip in California.
Of course, with most of the team heading home this weekend for 7-8 days, a lot of the responsibility to maintain a high level of training lies with each individual athlete on the team. Fortunately, the team is extremely dedicated to working through the "break." The commitment that this year's team has to one another is truly inspiring. There is no doubt that each athlete on the team will take full advantage of next week's opportunity have some much needed down-time from class work and use that mental break as an opportunity to refocus on swimming.
Though we won't have any NWC dual meets until January, December 6-8 is the Husky Invitational at the King County Aquatic Center in Federal Way, WA. Home to several US Open swim meets and NCAA DI Men's and Women's Championships, as well as the 2012 Olympic Trials for diving, the pool is truly world-class. The pool is also the location of the NWC Championships on February 14-16, 2014. The meet has the same order of events as our Conference Championships and is a great opportunity to post some fast swims with some great competition. At last year's Husky Invite, Karl Mering posted an "A" qualifying standard in the 100 butterfly, punching his ticket to Nationals and lighting a fire under the rest of the team to stay motivated and train hard through December and January. Similarly, last year, Claire Collins broke her own school record in the 200 breaststroke, posting an NCAA "B" time standard.
The meet is open to all club and college teams. Club teams from the San Francisco bay area, Portland, Seattle, Montana, and Idaho all attend the meet, many using it as a Winter Championship. On the college side, last year, Canadian powerhouses University of British Columbia and the University of Calgary came down and showed off some remarkable talent and depth. Other college teams present were DII Grand Canyon University, Simon Fraser University, University of San Diego, and University of Alaska Anchorage, DI Oregon State University and Seattle University, and 5 other teams from the NWC. Even though the top 32 qualifiers in each event make finals, with so many high-level club and collegiate teams present, making finals is no small feat. For last year's results, click here.
Between now and the Husky Invite, keep checking the Facebook page and Twitter for updates and other fun stuff!
Tuesday, November 19, 2013
Wednesday, November 13, 2013
Hour of Power 2013
Last night, the Whitman Swim Team participated in the 8th annual Ted Mullen Hour of Power relay. One of hundreds of other college, club and high school teams across the country to participate in the event, Whitman is is proud to be part of the event every year. The event consists of an hour-long relay race in which each team is required to stay on the same 50 throughout.
Carleton College started the event after Ted Mullen, a Carleton swimmer, passed away after a battle with Sarcoma cancer. Andy Clark, the head coach at Carleton and a Whitman alum was on campus back in 2011 for a reunion weekend during which he met with the team to discuss the event's importance and the legacy left by Ted Mullen.
At Whitman, and at other college campus all across the country, mid-November is stress-filled and hectic. Students are registering for next semester's classes, Fall semester classes are piling on the tests, papers, and group assignments, add in morning practices and away meets and this time of year can start to feel totally unrelenting. Fortunately, it's not. Taking an hour in the middle of the week to celebrate our health and our good fortune and the privilege of being students and athletes at such a remarkable institution is exactly what we needed.
We were back to the grind this morning at 6am but the celebration and the brief respite from the month's busy schedule were not forgotten. Though no one was exactly refreshed this morning, moral was good and we're excited for some great home meets this weekend!
We take on Lewis & Clark on Friday at 6pm and Pacific University at 1pm on Saturday. Pacific's women's team is coming off a big win against the University of Puget Sound last weekend. It's sure to be an exciting meet!
Monday, November 11, 2013
Last Weekend's Meets and a Look Towards this Weekend
We got off to a great start at our first Northwest Conference Dual meets of the season! Whitman's Men and Women defeated Linfield College and Willamette University easily last weekend. Both days had some great races for our swimmers! You can see full results and read a full recap of the weekend's swim meets here.
Though back-to-back weekends of away swim meets are a little wearing, we come away from the long bus rides and team meals a more cohesive and supportive team than we were just a couple weeks ago. As much fun as it is to swim fast and rack up some solid victories, a big part of our away meets is what happens off the pool deck.
The closeness that our team has on and off the deck is thanks, in large part, to the traveling that we get to do as a team. Where some college teams never have the experience of traveling more than an hour or two from campus, Whitman's swimmers get the experience of spending two whole days with each other every time we travel. It might not sound like fun to spend 5 hours on a bus two days in a row--but our swimmers walk away from trips like these past two weekends having taking countless bad photos of one another, experimenting with new hairstyles, and, of course, eating a lot. Ask any Whitman swimmer what parts of the season are the most fun and without a doubt, he or she will tell you it's all about the away meets and getting to spend time with the team.
This weekend, the level of competition gets cranked up a notch as we welcome the Lewis & Clark College and Pacific University teams to our only home meets of the season. Whitman's women have a long history of doing battle with Lewis & Clark, two times coming in 4th place at the NWC Championships, finishing just 1 point behind L&C each year. At last year's dual meets between Pacific and L&C, Whitman's women won, thanks to some outstanding breaststrokers and some killer free relays that neither team could match. L&C graduated the reigning NWC Champion in the 100 freestyle after 2012-13 season but it will almost certainly remain a tight contest on Friday night. On Saturday afternoon, Pacific's Katie Porter will give Whitman Freshman, Tai Hallstein, a great contest in the sprint events. Porter is the NWC Championship Meet record holder in both the 50 and 100 freestyle, at 23.58 and 52.06 respectively. She is also the defending NWC Champion in the 100 butterfly. At the 2012 Whitman vs. Pacific dual, Whitman needed to win the final freestyle relay in order to win the meet, which the Whitman women were able to do. Saturday's meet is not one you'll want to miss!
For Whitman's Men, L&C should provide some excellent races. Like last weekend's meet against Willamette, several of L&C's swimmers will go toe-to-toe with some of Whitman's swimmers. Historically, however, the Whitman Men have been able to handle what L&C brings to the table. Saturday's meet against Pacific should be extremely exciting! Pacific's Michael Hargitt, a Senior this year, is the reigning NWC Champion in both the 200 IM and 200 breaststroke. He was also runner up in the the 400 IM at last year's NWC Championships. Combined with some other solid swimmers on the team, Hargitt and the Pacific Men and Whitman's Men should have a close and exciting meet!
Friday's meet against Lewis & Clark starts at 6pm at Harvey Pool, Saturday against Pacific at 1pm. See you at the pool!
Though back-to-back weekends of away swim meets are a little wearing, we come away from the long bus rides and team meals a more cohesive and supportive team than we were just a couple weeks ago. As much fun as it is to swim fast and rack up some solid victories, a big part of our away meets is what happens off the pool deck.
The closeness that our team has on and off the deck is thanks, in large part, to the traveling that we get to do as a team. Where some college teams never have the experience of traveling more than an hour or two from campus, Whitman's swimmers get the experience of spending two whole days with each other every time we travel. It might not sound like fun to spend 5 hours on a bus two days in a row--but our swimmers walk away from trips like these past two weekends having taking countless bad photos of one another, experimenting with new hairstyles, and, of course, eating a lot. Ask any Whitman swimmer what parts of the season are the most fun and without a doubt, he or she will tell you it's all about the away meets and getting to spend time with the team.
This weekend, the level of competition gets cranked up a notch as we welcome the Lewis & Clark College and Pacific University teams to our only home meets of the season. Whitman's women have a long history of doing battle with Lewis & Clark, two times coming in 4th place at the NWC Championships, finishing just 1 point behind L&C each year. At last year's dual meets between Pacific and L&C, Whitman's women won, thanks to some outstanding breaststrokers and some killer free relays that neither team could match. L&C graduated the reigning NWC Champion in the 100 freestyle after 2012-13 season but it will almost certainly remain a tight contest on Friday night. On Saturday afternoon, Pacific's Katie Porter will give Whitman Freshman, Tai Hallstein, a great contest in the sprint events. Porter is the NWC Championship Meet record holder in both the 50 and 100 freestyle, at 23.58 and 52.06 respectively. She is also the defending NWC Champion in the 100 butterfly. At the 2012 Whitman vs. Pacific dual, Whitman needed to win the final freestyle relay in order to win the meet, which the Whitman women were able to do. Saturday's meet is not one you'll want to miss!
For Whitman's Men, L&C should provide some excellent races. Like last weekend's meet against Willamette, several of L&C's swimmers will go toe-to-toe with some of Whitman's swimmers. Historically, however, the Whitman Men have been able to handle what L&C brings to the table. Saturday's meet against Pacific should be extremely exciting! Pacific's Michael Hargitt, a Senior this year, is the reigning NWC Champion in both the 200 IM and 200 breaststroke. He was also runner up in the the 400 IM at last year's NWC Championships. Combined with some other solid swimmers on the team, Hargitt and the Pacific Men and Whitman's Men should have a close and exciting meet!
Friday's meet against Lewis & Clark starts at 6pm at Harvey Pool, Saturday against Pacific at 1pm. See you at the pool!
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