Adrenaline, team, competition, sports, friendship, and many more positive feelings. These are the emotions that swimming evokes. Michael Phelps started showing his first successes at the age of 16, so why are we worse? “It’s not hard to become a swimmer,” said a freshman and a team member, Viena Johnson. “If you start in high school, it will be a no-cut team, and you will get used to the flow of things and practices, as well as a lot more swimming experience.”
As a swimmer, you need to get used to the constant competition. Not talking about just away games but about intra-team ones. In every team there are several people who everyone follows and who push the team forward, setting its pace. So on the Prairie team, such people are Zoe Phed, Kenna Currier, and coach Sayle Lindsey. They help girls to try better and set an example of what they strive for, while they do not slow down and continue to improve their skills.
A huge plus in the swimming team is that you are like a team and represent the school. But no one can deny that with all this, you swim on your own and improve your time. Vienna, who has participated in many competitions, shared her experience. “The difficulty of a competition depends on the individual, but once you get used to how they work, they are mostly just fun. You swim your hardest in the races, but ultimately you are going for personal bests since swimming is a very individual sport” At competitions, you and the team merge into one and care for each other like a family.
This year our school is showing pretty good results. At districts, one of our 200 medley relays made it to state, and one swimmer made state in the 200m IM (Individual Medley) and 100m backstroke. The girls are simply beautiful and worked hard to achieve such results, many are proud of them as they are incredible and determined.
