By: Luke Hardy
Dear Sophomore Luke,
I know you are excited to be starting up something new at O’Dea. Joining the swim team is going to be a great decision made on your part and you’re going to love the fact that you joined the team in your senior year. However, there will also be times when it really just brings you down. One moment in particular.
On Friday January 26th, 2024, you are going to be swimming against Eastside Catholic, and O’Dea has one of their best meets of the year winning 137-33. However, you feel horrible after your race. It’s senior night and the whole family is there. After the senior celebration, you go to swim the 100 Freestyle and you are 0.9 seconds off getting a metro time.
You were so disappointed because you never had that opportunity to finally get a qualifying time. And when you finally got the chance, you absolutely blew it. It will be the only time ever that you will shed a tear because of a poor performance on your part.
Going back to sophomore year you were new to swimming and wanted to be a standout. So, you chose to swim the 100 Butterfly. You were by no means a star swimmer, but you put lots of effort into the race. To the point where you will get a wildcard spot to swim at metros for the 100 Butterfly.
During the race, it was you and one other swimmer, you were behind the entire time. Somehow, on the last length of the race, you powered through and won by 0.06th of a second. It was the best that you will ever feel after a race, because even though you were far from a qualifying time, you won your race, and all your friends and teammates were cheering as loud as they could for you.
After that season the team decided to vote for you as the next season’s captain. You still aren’t sure how you got it, but you are so glad that you were able to be a captain for your time in high school.
Anyways, when the next season comes around, since you had already challenged yourself with the 100 Butterfly, you wanted another challenge this time. And the next event that you chose was the 500 Freestyle. Yes, you are going to a distance swimmer for this and almost all next season. You have no clue how to swim a 500, in fact, your first time is going to be a 9:23. When the metro time is close to a 6-minute time (not exactly, but very close to it). Clearly, you had a lot of work to do.
Throughout the season, you will work on your 500 and eventually go to wildcard for metros in the 500 Freestyle. This time you felt you had a chance to qualify to come back the next day. However, you didn’t know that O’Dea already had 4 people ahead of you, which by the rules (no team is allowed 5 swimmer in an event on finals) you couldn’t swim the following day. You were still able to varsity letter and overall you enjoy this ending to your second season.
Now your third season, the one that will make you so happy at moments and so sad at others. Having been a captain for a year, you already knew what to expect for the most part. Throughout the season, you have 1 thing in mind, to work on the 100 Fly as well as the 500 Free. You wanted to swim both and get huge drops in your times. However, one meet, Coach Schutte, puts you in the 100 Freestyle. You hadn’t swam that since sophomore year.
In that race, you dropped a lot of time from the last time you swam it. So, coach had you work on it not to long after that meet. You will put your focus towards the other events, but when you swim against Garfield, you get a 1:05:56. You were just above 1 second from a metro cut, so the next week, you only focused on the 100 Freestyle.
The next meet was against Eastside Catholic, and it was also your senior night. After the 50 Freestyle, there was a nice and fun ceremony for the seniors. After that, you had about 5 minutes until you raced the 100 Freestyle for your last time. You swim it, and you have a worse time than what you had previously had. You got a 1:05:70. You were so mad at yourself that you shed a tear when you left the water.
Oh, but wait, you see that you are in a 400 Relay in event number 12, and you ask Coach Schutte if those times count for metros. And he replies, “Only the first swimmer, you will need to go first if you want to try and get a time.”
Your friend Gabe is swimming first and you tell him that you are going to go first to try and get the time. So, you go first, and guess what, you still don’t get it. This time you finish with a 1:05.20. You were within 1 second and couldn’t get it. You were so torn apart. You were thinking “I’ve been on this team for 3 year and couldn’t once get a metro time.”
Luckily for you, all your friends and family were super supportive and kept encouraging you. Coach Schutte will send out the meet entries for the metro meet, and you see that you are wildcarded in the 100 Freestyle. You realized that you now have a second chance. You spend all week working as hard as you can to make sure that you get this time. You pray about it all week, you ask God to give you strength to finish this race, and you ask Him that He please help you get a metro time and below a 1:04.30.
When the day of metro comes, you are so nervous, but you know that God is in control. You remember Colossians 3:23 where it says, “Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not men.” You are swimming not for you, not for anyone, but for God. He helped pave the way for you not only this season, but every season, and every year of your life to be here. So, because of that, you do this race for Him.
You hop on the blocks, and you see everyone up in the O’Dea section cheering you on. Dad is recording while Mom, Poppop, and everyone else are watching. You hear the buzzer go off and you swim your heart out. You finish with a 1:03.31! You did it! After 3 long and hard years, you got a metro time. The greatest single accomplishment you ever felt on the team. After a great race, you talk with Dad, Mom, and Poppop, and they tell you how proud they are of you and how amazing you were!
You finally did it, you had officially not only a season, but your high school swimming, the best way you could have done so. You spend the rest of the night cheering on not your teammate, but your friends as you watch each of them have great races of their own.
In short, you joining swim is going to be one of the best decisions you make. And you’re going to miss this team a lot. The friendships that you’ll make will last a lot longer than you think.
Go swim your heart out!
Best regards,
-Senior Luke