Back in the Pool

 WAC practice started back up for Nolan so now most of his evenings are spent back in the pool.

A Couple Races For My Guys.

Nolan has been swimming club swim all winter season, but unfortunately, some of his meet options have been limited due to the girls' swimming schedule or other things that have been on the calendar.  We've tried to split ways and let him go to a few smaller meets but he has also had to miss a few, especially as several of the meets have only met on Sunday and we try to avoid missing church for swim meets.  As he is coming down to the last couple of meets however, he was really wanting to hit some goals, one of which was making a divisional cut in his backstroke and so that meant that we chose to allow him to swim on a rare Sunday meet this past weekend.  

The two older girls asked if they could come with me so we all got up early on Sunday morning.  As soon as we backed out of the driveway, I realized that there was an icy glaze on all of the roads and in some places, it was nothing but a sheet of ice.  Our normal  50 minute drive would now become much longer.  We slipped around in a couple of places, but thankfully we made it safely there (even if my knuckles were pretty white from gripping the steering wheel) and he was only a few minutes late for warm-ups.

He went to check in and the girls and I went up to find a seat in the gallery.  The girls were anxiously watching for him to come back out and jump into the pool because it was freezing the week before at their conference meet and they wanted to see how he felt about it.  LOL  He did later say that it was one of the coldest pools that he has ever been in.

An hour or so after the meet started, he would swim the 50 freestyle.  He didn't quite get the time that he wanted for a divisional cut but he did better his previous time by over 2 seconds.

He is diving in from lane 4 and he's wearing the black shorts with the green on the sides.

He got out front right at the beginning and held his own for the first 25 but then he lost intensity on the back stretch and lost time as he came in under the flags.  The coach told him that if he could swim fast the entire race, he would easily make divisional cuts because he always starts off really quickly.

He was still leading after his turn, but then the rest of the field began to catch up.

He would finish in 2nd place in his heat with a time of 42.14.

Now we would just wait another hour until he swam again.  (We have been spoiled with not going to too many long club meets as high school meets are much quicker).  He would spend that time eating snacks, playing games, and talking to his friends.

Pretty soon it was time for his to swim the 50 backstroke.  He is without a swim cap in lane 4.

He actually got out to a pretty good lead again in this one but had a pretty shaky flip turn (where we anxiously held our breath because it looked like he should be DQ'd but thankfully he wasn't).

He would easily win his heat and finished with a new PR of 47.49 -- and he would get a divisional cut by only a tenth of a second!!  The girls and I were so excited for him and started yelling and clapping as soon as we saw his time but when we looked at him,  he didn't look very excited as he got out of the pool and walked over to his coaches.  (He later would admit that he thought the divisional time cut was actually two seconds faster and that he thought he had missed it).

As he was walking over to the coaches, they were grinning and clapping for him too but he still didn't realize that he had swam a cut, so it was fun to watch them tell him and then see him go from a serious look to covering his mouth in disbelief to jumping up and down in excitement.

'Such a blurry picture, but you get the idea!

His excitement continued on through the week as he got recognized at practice for a divisional cut and he was able to try on and order his divisional jacket!

Good job buddy!  I am so proud of you for your hard work this swim season.  You have stuck with it and it is paying off for you.

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My other guy also had a race on Sunday.  He would meet up with three other biking friends and they would head up to Michigan where they took place in a 25 mile dirt "fat bike" relay race.  I don't know a lot of details except that it was a cold and muddy mess and Noel had a lot of fun.  

He went up there without a lot of details except that he would be riding with three other teammates and they would have to finish 50 miles going around a half mile dirt track.  Apparently your teammate was required to ride a lap around (or as many as they wanted) and then as they came to the line, you would have to fist bump as an exchange before the next person would head off on the next lap.

Here is Noel waiting for his teammate to come down for the tag.

 Now that he knows what it is like, he knows that it's something he definitely wants to try again!  (This team gave him a bike to borrow so hopefully he won't feel the need to go buy one of his own for future races.  LOL)

I think they finished 7th overall.

Annual WAC swim-a-lap

Last Thursday and Friday nights were the evenings for the Warsaw Aquatic Club to complete their 2022 Swimathon for their annual fundraiser.  Since Nolan is part of the copper and bronze groups, he would be swimming his 100 lengths of the pool (or 50 full laps) and he would technically have two full hours to finish.  (Practice would be 5:30-7:30 that evening)

He was also suppose to have a roller skating party with his school from 6:00 - 8:00, so he asked how he would be able to do both.  I told him that the only way that he would be able to do both would be for him to complete all of his laps before 6:30 so that we'd have time to get over to the skating rink for at least one hour of skating.

Challenge accepted.  He swam all 50 laps in about 48 minutes and was completely out of the pool and ready to go in under an hour.  (He was actually the first swimmer out of the pool that night so I guess a roller skating party should motivate him for every race! LOL)

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When we arrived to start, the high school team was finishing up so Nolan went over to talk to some of the guys on the high school team.  

And then they were all getting ready to jump in right at 5:30.  You can see him in the black and green jammers standing in lane #4.  Goggles are on and he's not messing around at all.  He was certainly ready to get it all started as he had places to go.  LOL

The kids love it when the lights go out.

Congratulations Nolan on raising $165 for your team and completing all of your laps in a really great time!  Now let's go roller skate!

Nolan's first swim meet

Nolan joined the WAC swim team over a year ago.  (It's actually been almost a full year and a half, although that is so hard to believe!)  Although his swimming has really improved and he has moved from the bronze to the copper group, he has never had any interest in swimming in meets up to this point.  We had asked him at first but then we decided that he didn't ever need to compete if he really didn't want to so we stopped asking.  (Honestly, it makes our life a whole lot easier not having extra swim meets on the weekends.)  

Well, this year he suddenly decided that he wanted to make it his new goal to move up to the silver team and when he asked his coach about it, she told him that he would have to swim in a meet before he could move up.  Suddenly he started talking about competing and asking what meets he would be able to swim in.  The first meet of the season was actually a home meet and would have been a perfect meet for him to begin with but it was the same week as Marissa's state XC meet so we told him that he would have to wait until the next one and then we'd be sure to sign him up.  Although he didn't know how he could ever possibly wait that extra week to compete, he somehow did make it --  and Nolan competed in his first swim meet this past Saturday at the Kryder Memorial Invitational.  

It's been a while since we've sat through club meets or even thought about what to pack or how to write their events on their arms.  I'm thankful for older sisters who talked him through the process and helped explain what would happen to help set his mind at ease.  They had morning practice on Saturday but they promised him that they would drive up after their practice was over and that they'd both be there in time to watch him swim.  He seemed to like that too.  If he was nervous about it, he didn't act like he was, but on the way there, he asked me a couple more questions and then quietly admitted that he was a little nervous but that he thought he'd be okay.  He did seem to settle right in when it was time for warm-ups.  

He's standing in between lane 5 and 6 just before jumping into the freezing cold water.

They warmed up (in the freezing pool) for over 40 minutes and then they all went back to the stands to wait for their individual events.  Nolan would be swimming the 50 backstroke and the 50 freestyle in this first meet.  Since he didn't have any qualifying times, he would swim in the first heat for both events.

In the backstroke, he was down in lane 7.  He didn't want to miss the start, so he got up into the starting position early and then you could see his arms shaking as he tried to hold himself there until the buzzer sounded.  (In the picture below, he's the "albino" boy in the next to last lane).

Even though he was in the starting position, he was still tentative at the start and you can see that he's the last one out of the blocks, but he quickly started swimming and made up ground.  It wasn't very long into the race that he pulled into the lead.

He made his way into the lead....

We were a little anxious that he might get DQ'd on the flip turn but thankfully he did great and then his lead got even bigger as he headed to the finish.  First race out and that boy would win his heat!!  I apologize to those sitting around us.... his entire family was cheering for him.  We just couldn't help ourselves.... it was quite the exciting moment!

He finished with a time of 46.24 seconds and when both heats were combined, he placed 4th overall in that event.

First event out of the way and he's all smiles!

He would go back to the stands to wait for his next event and it was fun to look down and to see him watching the meet and cheering for his teammates.  Pretty soon he event was coming up and so the coach had them get into a line and walk back down to the starting blocks together before the freestyle was to begin.  Once again, because he hadn't swam in a meet before, he didn't have an entry time and would be swimming in the first heat of the freestyle.  You can see him all the way down in the first lane (beside the boy in the red swim cap)

He actually got a pretty good start in this one and about 15 yards into the race, he was dead even for first place.

And it stayed pretty close the entire first 25 yards of the race

But as he was heading into the wall, you could see that he was pulling ahead and as soon as he did a clean flip turn, his lead only got longer the farther that he swam.

He easily won his heat by about six seconds and when all of the heats were put together, he finished in 5th place overall.

The girls were cheering pretty loudly for him through the entire race and the celebration continued as he started walking past us.  I think he might have even been a bit embarrassed.  LOL

Good job Nolan!  You rocked that meet and we are all super proud of you!!