The Morning Swim Show, May 15, 2012: Elsie Windes Ready to Face Best Centers at Olympics

PHOENIX, Arizona, May 15. AMERICAN water polo player Elsie Windes joins today's edition of The Morning Swim Show shortly after testing out the waters at the Olympic water polo venue.

Windes, a virtual lock to be a part of the U.S. Olympic water polo squad when the names are announced this week, talks about playing in the Olympic venue at a test event two weeks ago. She also analyzes the wide-open field of teams that have a legitimate shot at the Olympic gold medal in August. 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 Tuesday, May 15th 2012. I am your host Peter Busch. In the FINIS Monitor today we will talk to Elsie Windes. She is a defender on the U.S.A Women's Water Polo National Team and getting ready for the summer Olympics and Elsie joins us right now in the FINIS Monitor from Long Beach California. Hey Elsie, welcome to the Morning Swim Show, how are you?

Elsie Windes: I am good. Thank you, thanks for having me.

Peter Busch: Yeah, it is a pleasure. You are in London recently playing at the Olympic venue, what's it like?

Elsie Windes: Yeah, oh, it was fabulous. We just got back yesterday and the venue was great. The Olympic Park was amazing, all the venues look really great and we had some good crowds come out, so it gives us an idea of what it is going to be like in July and August.

Peter Busch: Oh it should be exciting.

Elsie Windes: Yeah.

Peter Busch: Compare it for people who haven't seen it yet. Haven't seen pictures and obviously never been inside for most people. Kind of paint the picture of what it is like and maybe compare it to the Water Cube in Beijing?

Elsie Windes: Yeah. Well normally in Beijing we played in a 50 meter pool and there was a diving well as well and stands going all the way down, so this is just a pool built for Water Polo. It is a temporary pool but the stands are just kind of straight up from the pool so everyone — there is not a bad seat in the house. We walked all the way up to the top and looked down and kind of got a view of what it looks like from up top and it is a great water polo pool.

Peter Busch: Very cool. It is very tough to tell who the favorite is right now, who is the best women's water polo team in the world.

Elsie Windes: Yeah, it is very had to tell. The Greeks who won world championships, they didn't qualify and you know the Netherlands who are the gold medalist from the Beijing, they also didn't qualify, but there is a lot of great teams out there. Australia won the test event and Italy, Hungary — I mean there is not an easy team out there so it is going to be a battle the whole way.

Peter Busch: All right fill in the blank for me. The U.S.A could win because, blank?

Elsie Windes: Because we can beat teams many different ways with all of our players and you know it is not just one superstar. We have great defenders, great goalies, great attackers, great centers so we can beat teams a ton of different ways.

Peter Busch: Now you are a defender primarily, you do score some goals, get in on that action sometimes, but–

Elsie Windes: I have tried.

Peter Busch: Toughest person to guard that you have ever faced?

Elsie Windes: Well I would say the girls I have to guard everyday in our own practices, but looking at other teams, you know some of the centers are you know quick and small and really a lot of movement like one of the Italian centers, but then there is also some bigger girls and you just have to be strong and push like the Hungarian center and Australia and stuff so it is a wide variety.

Peter Busch: Okay there is not one particular one though that is like the superstar that you just– you got to put your game face on that when you are playing them.

Elsie Windes: I wouldn't say there is one in particular. I would say every team has that one very dominant center so try to match up with her.

Peter Busch: All right. Gold medal game you have got a penalty shot, where are you going with it?

Elsie Windes: I always like, skip to the goalie's right but I usually don't take penalty shots thank goodness.

Peter Busch: Well you know if it goes to 7 or 8 or 9 or 10.

Elsie Windes: Yeah, exactly.

Peter Busch: You know how to score a goal.

Elsie Windes: Yeah, yeah.

Peter Busch: Is there– I mean do you guys do research on where or scouting reports on where certain goalie is more vulnerable, you know high, low, left, right?

Elsie Windes: Yeah, I mean we try and you know not only read other team's shooters but also read their goalies you know if they like to play with their hands low or high or you know if they're susceptible to the over-the-head shot or you know going back cross cage so there is definitely scouting that goes into each goalie, too.

Peter Busch: Okay, you are one of the only people in the national team not from California, right?

Elsie Windes: Yeah, myself and our goal keeper Betsey Armstrong is from Michigan.

Peter Busch: And you are from Oregon, correct?

Elsie Windes: Yeah, Portland.

Peter Busch: Okay, so they play water polo there too?

Elsie Windes: Yeah, they have a program and my high school has a program so yeah we try a lot of the older girls you know also went and played collegiately in California and elsewhere.

Peter Busch: Have all the other girls these Cali girls grew up you know beach bums have they, you have adapted that lifestyle with them?

Elsie Windes: Yeah, I have. Now living in Long Beach, I have tried surfing and stand up paddle boarding and all that good stuff.

Peter Busch: Yeah, it is not a bad way to live.

Elsie Windes: Yeah, it is not, that is for sure. My mom gets jealous when I talk about how sunny it is all the time and it is been raining for a month straight in Oregon.

Peter Busch: Yeah, you made a good, choice moving a little bit down the coast a little bit.

Elsie Windes: Yeah.

Peter Busch: So what are the next couple of months look like for you. Kind of describe you know where you guys will be training, camps, more events and just kind of give people the life of the water polo player for the next couple of months?

Elsie Windes: Yeah, we–actually our team gets announced next week so that will be exciting and then at the end of this month we are going to China for World League. We will be there for a little over a week and then we come home and June is pretty much just training here, we train out Los Alamitos. There is a base there that we train at and so we will be there 6 days a week usually twice a day so kind of — January's our time to get the work in and then July we are hoping to have some games here. Hopefully one up at Stanford and then end of July we head over, so it is coming up quick.

Peter Busch: How exciting.

Elsie Windes: Yeah, very.

Peter Busch: Well congratulations on you know being a part of this special team. I wish you guys the best of luck in London this summer.

Elsie Windes: Thank you so much thanks for having me on.

Peter Busch: All right that is Elsie Windes joining us from U.S.A women's water polo team. That is it for today's show. I am Peter Bush reminding you to keep your head down at the finish.

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