Swimming highlights so far

The kids have both been swimming on the swim team this summer. This is Evan's second season as a Wahoo and Pressley's first. I am very proud of both of them. Evan continues to improve and is learning the breast and butterfly this year.

But, Pressley has made the most progress. When we started practice in early May, she couldn't swim the whole length of the pool without stopping to hold on to the lane lines. By the first meet, she was easily swimming 25 yards in freestyle and was able to make it 25 yards in backstroke as well. Granted, it took her almost 2 whole minutes (1:58 to be exact) to do it since she was almost completely vertical in the water. She got lots of attention from the crowd and grinned ear to ear when she heard people cheering for her as she inched slowly toward the finish.

Last week (the third meet) was quite a difference from the first meet. Due to a clerical error, she was entered in the meet late and ended up swimming in the first heat of both of her races (as opposed to the 4th heat in the first two meets). I was worried sick. I didn't mind her coming in last, but I was so afraid that she'd be scarred by finishing so much slower than the other girls. But, my baby rose to the occasion. She came in last in the free style race, but only by a nose. And, she managed a 5th place finish in her backstroke, beating one other little girl. Her times were personal bests by a long shot. I was SO proud!!

Fast forward to last night: I had been noticing Pressley holding on to the lane lines a lot in practice the last couple of days, so we did a lot of talking about the importance of keeping on keeping on - even if your arm brushes against the lane line or your goggles fill with water. She said she was going to do just that.

First up was her relay. Unfortunately, she jumped into the water without putting her goggles down over her eyes, so she stopped about 4 times to put them on and then adjust them repeatedly. Still, her relay team finished second, so... no harm no foul.

Next up was her freestyle race. She dove in and looked poised for a second or third place finish in the second heat. Then, she disappeared from the surface of the water. I was puzzled, but continued to cheer her on to the finish. When she surfaced and climbed out of the pool, she held out her hand and proudly announced, "Look what I found!" and showed us the bracelet she had retrieved from the bottom of the pool during the middle of her race. Hilarious. What else could we do but laugh. I mean, she's five. What five year old girl wouldn't do the same...?

Then came Evan's freestyle race. Corin and I were poised to cheer him on. The whistle blew...and he jumped into the pool...backwards. He appeared to be headed back toward the block when he noticed he was being left behind by the other swimmers. So, he rolled onto his back and took off. Doing the backstroke. While all the other swimmers swam freestyle.

Amazingly, he managed to come in 4th or 5th, despite the fact that he was doing a harder stroke, but I'm pretty sure they must've disqualified him, so I'm guessing there will be no ribbon for that one.

All in all - not the best race for the McCarthy kids. It is a good thing that our attitude about swim team is that we're just thrilled to have them learning to swim and becoming strong swimmers. We don't place a whole lot of emphasis on winning, because I'm guessing that this won't be something they choose to compete in long term. So, we'll just chalk up last night as a learning experience. And chuckle.