Updates & Best Posts
Archive for October, 2009
Do Phelps, Hoff and Kukors Stand A Chance?
Friday, October 30th, 2009U.S. stars Michael Phelps, Katie Hoff and Ariana Kukors have decided to throw out their long, technical swimsuits before the items are officially banned in January. But will they do anything other than make a statement?
Day 103: Full Steam Ahead
Friday, October 30th, 2009I thought about it a lot last night, and I considered that my arm was being annoying and my legs were exhausted and sure, easing up a bit might seem like it makes sense. I DO want to go best times next weekend. The bottom line, though, is that I’m in this thing to work, and so I just want to put my head down and work — and whatever happens in the November Open … happens.
Day 102: This One’s Dedicated To…
Thursday, October 29th, 2009Curl-Burke Coach Jeff King dedicates a lengthy kick set full of sprint kicking to reporter Paul Tenorio, who could only kick today because of his triceps, and makes sure to tell the whole group Tenorio is to blame if they don’t like the set.
Day 101: Like a Buoy in the Ocean
Wednesday, October 28th, 2009Reporter Paul Tenorio’s workout this morning started well — with jump rope, a swim warm up and a decent start to a test set — but as he reached the wall on the first 50 on his final 100 race and his right triceps flared up once again.
High Schoolers, Short Suits Will Appear in Dec. Duel
Wednesday, October 28th, 2009Five high school girls — one just out of eighth grade — will try to help Michael Phelps, Ryan Lochte and other U.S. veteran stars beat Great Britain, Italy and Germany in a made-for-television meet in Manchester, England. And Katie Hoff and Ariana Kukors will be there, too, donning short, 2010-model suits.
Trust Fund Set Up For Four Merrill Sisters
Wednesday, October 28th, 2009UPDATED: A trust fund for the young swimmers whose parents died in a car accident this past weekend has been set up, and funeral arrangements have been made.
Swimmers Mourn Loss of Beloved Swim Parents
Tuesday, October 27th, 2009Monday’s 4:30 a.m. practice at the Lee District RECenter started with questions, confusion and tears. Swimmers wanted reassurance about their dear swim mates, sisters Emma and Molly Merrill, 13 and 9, in the aftermath of a car accident late Saturday afternoon that took the lives of their parents.
Day 100: Work Before Work
Tuesday, October 27th, 2009Reporter Paul Tenorio realizes how important it is for practices to be so early in the morning, and after a night in which he went to bed 10 minutes before he usually wakes up, Tenorio struggles to carve out enough time to work out before the evening — not the ideal situation for Day 100.
Day 99: A Good Failure Feeling
Monday, October 26th, 2009Today’s workout was more dry-land, some sprint work that had Paul Tenorio working hard to get through the whole set, and finally a positive weigh-in in which Tenorio dropped two more pounds and 2.4 percent body fat.
Kids Wanted: Area Meets Designed For Youngsters
Monday, October 26th, 2009Sunday’s dual meet between North Baltimore Aquatic Club and Curl-Burke Swim Club in Baltimore represented everything local coaches say they want more of: fast-paced, team competitions designed just for 14-and-under swimmers.
Day 96: Unconventional, Yet Effective
Friday, October 23rd, 2009Curl-Burke Coach Jeff King ends an intense week with an equally intense dry-land/in-pool workout that includes plenty of medicine ball work, abs routines, jump rope and, of course, some swimming.
Johannes Wins Five Golds
Friday, October 23rd, 2009Mount Vernon High junior Anna Johannes, 16, won five gold medals in six events at the Youth Parapan American Games, Bogota DC, Colombia, taking a major step toward her goal of competing in the 2012 Paralympics in London.
Phelps Puts Reputation On Line For Supplement
Thursday, October 22nd, 2009Though the World Anti-Doping Agency calls the use of dietary supplements by athletes “a concern” and advises “extreme caution” regarding their use, Olympic star Michael Phelps touts PureSport’s dietary supplement products and says he does not fear a positive drug test.
Day 95: Good vs. Bad Pain
Thursday, October 22nd, 2009Reporter Paul Tenorio works through most of another tough set before having to adjust the workout because of some bad pain in his right triceps. It’s part of the process of recognizing bad pain vs. good pain.
Day 94: A Lot of Time to Think
Wednesday, October 21st, 2009After a high-intensity kick workout yesterday that had reporter Paul Tenorio feeling pretty sore Wednesday morning, Coach Jeff King turned things around with a set of three 1500s, a distance swim like no other Tenorio had ever done.
Sputtering Growth In The Region: Why?
Wednesday, October 21st, 2009What happened? As USA Swimming celebrated an 11.2-percent increase in membership in 2009, Potomac Valley Swimming officials swallowed hard. The region’s once hot membership growth slowed. Now we want to know why.
Day 93: Legs … and legs … and abs
Tuesday, October 20th, 2009Today’s set was a new one for reporter Paul Tenorio, and I think it was most enjoyable for Coach Jeff King. The practice was all about legs and kicking, legs and kicking — and it wasn’t all in the pool.
Swimming For Gold
Tuesday, October 20th, 2009Anna Johannes, 16, churned up the water with the rest of the Potomac Marlins at a recent dawn practice. Though missing one arm below the elbow, Anna had no trouble keeping up with her able-bodied teammates. In fact, in many ways, she was leaving them behind.
Day 92: A Weekend to Remember
Monday, October 19th, 2009Reporter Paul Tenorio recaps his weekend at the October Open, from the ups and downs of the two races, to the support he received from swimmers and others at Fairland, to his goals moving forward and his eyes already set on the November Open.
Season Begins with PVS October Open, RMSC Kickoff Classic
Monday, October 19th, 2009The Potomac Valley Swimming season opened this weekend with the October Open, a large meet that serves as the first major event of the year for many swimmers in the area. The weekend also played host to the Rockville-Montgomery Swim Club Kickoff Classic.
Thumbs Up: Hardy Gets Third WR In Second Meet
Sunday, October 18th, 2009Jessica Hardy loudly announced her return to the sport this weekend. In her first international meet since serving a one-year suspension — and missing the 2008 Summer Games — for taking a contaminated supplement, she set a world record and won a trio of gold medals.
Day 89: Muscle Memory
Friday, October 16th, 2009Today’s workout was based around the idea of muscle memory. Through repetition I was, I hope, developing the right stroke naturally so that I wouldn’t have to constantly tell myself (or be told) that I was getting sloppy.
Suits and Nations Change, But USA Vs. Europe On
Friday, October 16th, 2009The suit rules unraveled, the competing countries changed, and small details continue to flummox organizers, but a USA-vs.-Europe meet slated for Dec. 18-19 in Manchester, England, will go on as scheduled — if not nearly as planned.
FINA Puts Out List of Approved 2010 Suits
Thursday, October 15th, 2009The world swimming governing body on Thursday put out a list of approved suits for the 2010 competitive season. Click here to see which suits made the cut, and which did not.
Day 88: Testing the 100
Thursday, October 15th, 2009Reporter Paul Tenorio experiences his first meet-style warm-up (yes, it was crowded) and swims a 100 for time for the first time since early August, a welcome challenge with just two days until he swims one for real in the October Open.
Q: Does The Suit Make The Swimmer? A: (Here)
Thursday, October 15th, 2009Will German sensation Paul Biedermann be a superstar next year, after the new suit rules have kicked in? What about Americans Ariana Kukors, Tyler Clary, David Walters and Eric Shanteau? Were their breakthrough seasons coincidental to the suit revolution, or spurred by it? What do you think?
Members Learn Plenty at PVS Swimposium
Thursday, October 15th, 2009Potomac Valley Swimming held its bi-annual Swimposium at the start of October. The day-long event taught swimmers, parents, coaches, club owners and officials how best to improve.
Day 87: Happy Birthday…Ready to Race?
Wednesday, October 14th, 2009Paul Tenorio celebrates his birthday with some donuts, works some more on breath control and starts and talks about his continued anticipation of the weekend’s Open, as well as the advice he got from another Curl swimmer.
Phelps: I’m Racing In A Jammer. Anyone Else?
Wednesday, October 14th, 2009Michael Phelps yanked himself out of the pool at Loyola College late last week and pronounced himself exhausted, hurting and, by his standards, out of shape.
But he wasn’t in too much pain to throw down a little challenge.
From Olympics to Sea Devils, Tinkham Shines
Tuesday, October 13th, 2009Bob Bowman and Rick Curl aren’t the only Olympic coaches in the area — they’re merely the latest. Stan Tinkham, 77, led the U.S. women’s Olympic team to six medals at the 1956 Summer Games in Melbourne, Australia, and still coaches elite prep swimmers at Sea Devil Swimming.
Day 86: Night and Day
Tuesday, October 13th, 2009Paul Tenorio works on breath control, experiences the wonderful effects of a new pair of not-as-dark goggles, finishes practice with a set of IMs and talks about his anticipation ahead of the weekend’s October Open.
Day 85: Mmm, Chinese Food.
Monday, October 12th, 2009The cold chinese food breakfast was awesome. The spread looked great and everyone was enjoying the food. I limited myself to one small plate with some chicken lo mein, pork fried rice, a few pieces of beef and broccoli and two pieces of sweet and sour chicken. Oh yeah, and I swam before that, too.
‘A Roomful Of Tears’; Swim Cuts Still Hurt
Sunday, October 11th, 2009Many have lamented the elimination of dozens of college swimming programs over the last two decades, but Jacob Torok, a hard-working swimmer out of Newtown, Pa., lived through an experience he described as nothing short of a nightmare — twice.
Day 82: Back to Work
Friday, October 9th, 2009Paul Tenorio gets back into the pool today after clearing up his “injury” and unfortunately has to do way too much butterfly before re-focusing on his starts — a crucial part of his race where he feels he is not yet comfortable.
Georgetown Looks To Freshmen For Success
Friday, October 9th, 2009The Georgetown swimming and diving team is starting the season on a high, after finishing second at the Potomac Relays last week — its best finish ever.
Local LLS Swim-A-Thon a Success
Thursday, October 8th, 2009The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society holds a local fundraising swim-a-thon each year. This year the event raised more than $78,000.
Day 81: Taking My Lumps…to the Doctor
Thursday, October 8th, 2009I have a pretty decent-sized lump on the inside of my left wrist, noticeable enough to be visible from a distance and enough for Jeff to see it from a few feet away without me saying much other than, ‘Could I have done this yesterday while I was diving?’ and then sticking my arm out.
Day 80: Learning to Pace
Wednesday, October 7th, 2009After never having done a 200 while trying to shoot for a time, Paul Tenorio learns to find the right combination of building and sprinting in the to come in at the right time.
Day 79: Snow Day! Sleep Day!
Tuesday, October 6th, 2009This is not me complaining about the early wake ups. Honestly I’m fine getting in the pool whenever, and Jeff sent out a nice, long extended swim workout at 8 this morning so whenever I finish my work for the day I’ll head over to a pool and try to knock it out if I can. But the point was that I was going to get to sleep in. HA! SLEEEEP!
Day 78: A Life Changing Experience
Monday, October 5th, 2009Today I weighed in at 179 pounds. That’s 14 pounds lighter than I was 78 days ago. I haven’t been in the 170s probably since my freshman year in college. When I looked down at the scale, I couldn’t believe that it read that number. I also dropped another inch on my waistline.
New Swim Season Kicks Off, But With Sadness
Sunday, October 4th, 2009The special swim caps and wristbands they ordered hadn’t arrived yet, but more than 20 DC Wave swimmers competed anyway at Sunday’s 2009 All-Freestyle Meet at the Fairland Aquatic Center, hoping to do honor to a dear teammate’s memory.
Day 75: I Believe I Can Fly
Friday, October 2nd, 2009Jeff King told them they’d be doing 20 200 IMs. Pat Sullivan’s face was pure comedy, and it took everything I had not to laugh. Here I was thinking I’d get a nice freestyle set and these poor kids had to do 20 200 IMs. It was all fun and games. Then Jeff called me over.
Bal Will Offer Lessons On Swimming, Life
Friday, October 2nd, 2009Randal Bal can teach plenty about the sport of swimming, and even more about handling tough times. He will be trying to impart his experience on both fronts to the young swimmers he will meet Saturday at the Potomac Valley Swimming Swimposium.
District’s Own Swim Club Seeks Growth in ’09-10
Thursday, October 1st, 2009With the club swimming season kicking off for all of Potomac Valley Swimming at Sunday’s 2009 All Freestyle Meet at Fairland Aquatics Center, perhaps no team enters the year ahead with higher hopes for growth than the District’s own team, the DC Wave, which will send more than two dozen swimmers to Sunday’s opening event.
Day 74: Different Day, Different Workout
Thursday, October 1st, 2009The set was six 500s on 7 minutes 15 seconds (except for the distance swimmers, who were going on 6:15). I wanted to raise my hand and say, “Hey, Jeff, remember me? Washington Post reporter here. Uh, only a few weeks ago I did 3,000 in a workout for the first time. Hi, yeah. That’s a set of 3,000 after a warm up and on an interval.”
