A Tribute to Swimming’s Most Valuable Lessons

Photo Courtesy: Sophia Chiang

By Sophia Chiang, Swimming World College Intern

I could never bring myself to quit swimming. A week ago, I began my freshman year at university: a time I had once promised myself would be less dedicated to swimming and more to academics, career furthering, and that vaguely promising specter known as a “social life” that I had always envied non-swimmers for.

But even after more than a decade dedicated to a sport that at times seems like I’ve given my entire childhood to, I could never stop.

You can often find me saying that swimming is the worst sport on the planet. At times, it is. It is when you wake up at 4 a.m. to January blizzards, and have to dig your car out of your driveway to drop your body into a vat of cold water by 5 a.m. It is when your coach assigns sets of 10 200s fly at the end of your second practice of the day, after a fight with your parents, after you failed your math exam that morning, after you just felt sick all day.

But then, there’s those times when you’re flying. Literally– when you feel that spurt of energy coming and crash full force into that final wall, look up, and see you’ve hit a best time. When you realize those people you swim with everyday have become your family, and those gruesome IM or distance free sets that your coach handed out have become the glue that binds you all.

You’re not always happy per se, but rather swimming and all of the experiences and lessons it brings with it gives you that warm feeling inside that you can pinpoint as contentment.

No, not contentment with your times.

But contentment with who you are.

Because between all those doubles sessions, heinous dry land workouts, and mind-numbingly-long age group meets, you discover that somehow, swimming has created the person you were meant to be. The person you’ve always wanted to be. The person whose ambition pushes them to chase after career goals; the person whose responsibility to get to practice on time on the daily puts them in favor with their superiors; the person whose hardworking ethic gets them to grind even when the going is tough and produces the best results, and, most importantly, the person who not only knows who they are, but is also comfortable with that.

These lessons will be here with us even when cut times have faded into oblivion, when our records are long shattered, and when doubles seem like ill dreamt nightmares. I want to tell my 2-year-old self—who began her swimming career when her mother enrolled her in Mommy and Me swimming classes at the local YMCA— you’ve got the most amazing years of training, plateauing, and succeeding ahead of you. I know those days aren’t over yet, though, and I won’t let them be for a long while.

So, here I am, at the beginning of freshman year, staring down four more years of swimming. And you know what? Bring them on.

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Bill Bell

8 years ago

Sophie:

Best of luck in your collegiate career. Don’t know what school you are attending although I think you’re at Michigan but in any event work hard, make NCAA cuts and — who knows ? — by the time the national collegiate meet is done in spring of 2K19 you may just be on the top step of the podium.
Josh Schmeider, one of our best sprinters and a leading candidate to make the team to Rio, was an obscure and mist unheralded rookie when he entered Cincinnati some years ago and he went on to become the Bearcats’ first and so far only NCAA champ.
Guess what? He puts his suit on just like you — one leg at a time!

the podium.

Linda Griswold

8 years ago

Nice article, Sophia, and oh, so true! Best of luck this year in college! We miss you!

Lucy

8 years ago

Wow! So well written. I am very proud of you. I will share your article with John and his staff.

Yang Cai

8 years ago

Sophie,
I’m so proud of you. You’re my hero!
Your proud Mama

Crissy judge

8 years ago

You got it! My hope is for my kids to understand what you do. Swimming will always be a part of your life. Nice article and good luck.