The Morning Swim Show, March 15, 2012: Jason Schnur Ready to Go to NCAAs as 50 Free Top Seed


PHOENIX, Arizona, March 15. JASON Schnur will be the top seed in the men's 50 freestyle at the men's Division I NCAA championships, and he talks about his rapid improvement on today's edition of The Morning Swim Show.

Schnur, a junior at The Ohio State University, has dropped almost a second from his best time in the 50 free in a year, and he talks about his goals and his team's expectations for the meet, as well as the comparisons shared with him and NCAA champion Josh Schneider. Be sure to visit SwimmingWorld.TV for more video interviews.

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Morning Swim Show Transcripts
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(Note: This is an automated service where some typos and grammatical errors may occur.)

Peter Busch: This is the Morning Swim Show for Thursday, March 15th, 2012. I'm your host Peter Busch in the FINIS Monitor today. We talked to Jason Schnur. The Ohio State junior is the top seed in the 50 free for this week's Division I NCAA championships. Jason joins us right now in the FINIS Monitor from Columbus, Ohio. Jason welcome to the Morning Swim Show. How are you?

Jason Schnur: I am good how are you?

Peter Busch: Good. You have been doing some big time drops in the past year or so. We had you at 19.99 in December of 2010 not too long ago and now you are going 19.1.

Jason Schnur: Yeah.

Peter Busch: What do you attribute the big drops in the past year or two?

Jason Schnur: What was that?

Peter Busch: What do you attribute the big drops in the past year or two?

Jason Schnur: Well the biggest drop was my 50 — well it was almost a whole second going from 19.99 to 19.12, but I think the main reason why I have been dropping so much time is because you know this is essentially my first whole year of swimming that I have completed with Ohio State so you know in years before I have only just done the winter season and then you know done running and something else starting in the summer time but you know this is my first full year swimming and it is done. It has done me a lot of good. It is actually hold on to my technique for a whole year so I would say that is what made my stroke so much better.

Peter Busch: Yeah, I noticed that you have an interesting athletic background did a lot of track in high school, high jump, pole vaulting and things like that so you are really now just kind of learning what swimming is all about on a year round basis?

Jason Schnur: Yeah, yeah.

Peter Busch: How did you wind up at Ohio State because you transferred there, correct?

Jason Schnur: No, I didn't transfer there I just. I started here my freshman year.

Peter Busch: Okay my bad but you hadn't been training there year round?

Jason Schnur: No, no. I live in Cincinnati, Ohio and that is the one of the main reasons why I went to Ohio State is to be close to my family and so over the summer I would just go back home and then work with my dad mainly but you know now I mean since I am so close that I don't really have to go back a number of the summer and you know I can just visit occasionally so that is good.

Peter Busch: All right so what is something that you have learned specifically in the past year that has made you an elite sprinter now?

Jason Schnur: I would say the one thing that I always think about during my races is just the stroke that I have been practicing you know in the pool during practice. One thing that me and Bill have been working on was shoulder driven freestyle technique so you know we have been trying to work it in to a lot of practices during the week so when get in to the meet situation, I come in feeling comfortable that I can use that technique and swim fast.

Peter Busch: And what does that mean shoulder driven freestyle. Is that like a straight arm?

Jason Schnur: Yeah, no it is not a straight arm it is more–. It is not compared to hip driven freestyle, which is what you use for your 100. Shoulder driven is more of you know driving your shoulders instead of your hips. I'm trying to keep my hips nice and flat but still connected to my kick, but hips have increased. My hips are driving on either side and that is what I would use for the 100.

Peter Busch: So it is just total upper body strength for the 50?

Jason Schnur: Yeah. Pretty much.

Peter Busch: This is a very — the story is kind of reminiscent to Josh Schneider you know the Cincinnati guy who came out of nowhere and had tremendous success in his last couple college years in the 50 and is still you know now one of America's best sprint freestylers.

Jason Schnur: Yeah.

Peter Busch: You know he played football in high school, was a very raw talent. I am sure you have heard that comparison before.

Jason Schnur: I actually grew up about 6 minutes away from Josh because he went to Taylor High School and I went to Oak Hills, but the part of that Ohio that I lived in was about like 6 minutes away from his house.

Peter Busch: Have you had a conversation with him about you know about being kind of green at one point but figuring it out later in your college years?

Jason Schnur: Yeah.

Peter Busch: Did he give you any advice?

Jason Schnur: Actually he has been. Every time I would see him I would compete against him at a meet like the summer sectionals or something like that, and I would go up to him and you know he would offer me some advice and we have been keeping some contact there on Facebook about this upcoming NCAA meet so he has been helping me a lot actually.

Peter Busch: Okay so you know you are the top seed in the Division 1 Swimming Championships which usually mean that you have the fastest time in college but a guy from a junior college, Indian River, just went 19-flat last week. Brad Tandry — that could be the first year that you ever see you know the Division 1 guy not be the fastest so now you have got somebody to beat.

Jason Schnur: 19.06 in 50, 42.7 in his 100. That is incredible.

Peter Busch: Yeah it is pretty good so you know even if you win you got to keep that in mind right?

Jason Schnur: Yeah.

Peter Busch: Tell me about the team this year, how do you guys look and what are the team goals?

Jason Schnur: Well, by looking in the — as compared to NCAA championship?

Peter Busch: Yeah.

Jason Schnur: We are looking good. We have a lot of freshman talent coming up and that has yet to develop you know I guess transferring from a high school swimmer into a college swimmer so you know we got the talent and we got the depth but our team definitely needs to mature a little bit. I feel like our team is going do so much better at NCAA overall than what we are going to do this year, but yeah have a young team but we are graduating a bunch of real good seniors. Andrew Elliot, he is going to be leaving but he is going to be staying with us next year as a graduate assistant so that is good. But overall you know our relays are going to do real well but I would I think we would have liked to have more individual qualifiers to the meet.

Peter Busch: Well Jason this is your year to be a breakout star. Enjoy the moment.

Jason Schnur: Okay, thank you.

Peter Busch: And good luck at the meet. Thanks for joining us.

Jason Schnur: All right.

Peter Busch: All right that is Jason Schnur from Ohio State joining us in the FINIS Monitor. That is it for today's show I am Peter Busch reminding you to keep your head down at the finish.

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