T&T top swimmer, George Bovell III has described 2012 as his best year ever in the sport, but not just based on his stellar performances in the pool. The 29-year-old Bovell III, a four-time Olympian and 2004 Athens Greece Olympics bronze medal winner in the men’s 200m individual medley, was speaking on his return home on Christmas Eve at a reception held in his honour by the Ministry of Sport and the Sport Company of T&T (SporTT) at the VIP Lounge, Piarco International Airport on Monday night.
Those in attendance included Bovell III’s coach and Minister of Sport Anil Roberts, SporTT chairman and former Olympic swimmer Sebastian Paddington, special advisor to the Minister of Sport Caryl Kellar, senior manager/executive manager Corporate Services Adrian Raymond, senior manager Corporate Communications Nyssa Pierre, and the parents of the history-making local swimmer George Bovell II and Barbara Bovell.
The reception was held to celebrate Bovell III’s recent achievement of a first ever swimming medal—bronze—for T&T at a FINA World Short Course Championship when he clocked 51.66 seconds for third behind USA’s Ryan Lochte (51.21) and Australian Kenneth To (51.38) at the Sinan Erdem Arena, Istanbul, Turkey. A former NCAA swimming champion with Auburn University, Bovell III also missed out on a medal in the men’s 50m freestyle final when he raced home in 21.03 seconds for fourth spot, well short of his 20.82 national record sat during the Short Course World Cup in Sweden on October 14.
Russian Vladimir Morozov won in 20.55 seconds to beat Olympic champion France’s Florent Manaudou (20.88) and USA’s Anthony Ervin (20.99), Bovell’s main rival in the event on the World Cup circuit. Prior to the World Championship, Bovell, who was seventh in the men’s 50m freestyle final at the London Olympics, had won 16 medals during the FINA/ARENA Swimming World Cup series, comprising seven gold and nine silver while establishing new national records in the 50m freestyle (20.82 in Stockholm, Sweden) on October 14 and in the 100m IM (51.20) in Berlin, Germany, six days later while he captured gold (100m IM) and silver (50m freestyle) at the Vladimir Salnikov Cup in Russia on Friday and Saturday.
All this after he was knocked briefly unconscious when he was involved in an early morning vehicular accident near the Manzanilla Secondary School on August 10, last year. In his brief moment at the podium, Bovell who spent 38 hours travelling from St Petersburg, Russia, to be with family and friends for the Christmas holidays said, “This year, looking back on it, I started off in a very bad way.” “I started off with seven weeks of the season of doing nothing. I was very frail. I had been in bed and faced with the possibility of doing brain surgery and having a stroke and to bounce back and finish this year off with a World Championship medal, the number-two time in the world and the fourth time in the world, I think.
“As long as I live it’s something I am actually more proud of, more than my Olympic medal or my world record, just because of my sheer will and just the way I started off this year. “Because it takes you about four or five months to get back to where you were and three more months to get ready for the Olympics and then to keep pushing through this whole season I think it was great.” Regarding the up and downs of his career and races in which he has come very close to being among the medals in previous World Championships and Olympic Games, Bovell said, “I must say I cannot believe it.”
He noted, “I have been fourth at the World Championship so many times, maybe two or three times, and also fifth, and I have come so close so many times and its cruel when it happens because you look back and wonder what you could have done different to make up the one, two, three and four hundredths of a second you miss a medal by because you want it so badly and you are so close, yet so far.” “To have that feeling over and over in my career and knowing that final in Turkey was actually my ninth at a World Championship was tough. “You can imagine going into the final the pressure I was under, to come in nine times in a final and not get a medal. “I said to myself: ‘you know how bad that would be.’ “You know that would give you the feeling of not being able to sleep at night if that happens, right.”
He admitted, “There was definite pressure on me, so I had to come in and keep it cool and unfortunately that is how it goes in sport sometimes, you have ups and downs.” Reflecting on his performances in Turkey during the December 12 to 16 World Championship, Bovell III, a double gold and silver Pan American Games medallist, said he wasn’t able to replicate some of his top times from the World Cup and thought it was due to the fact that he took on too much. “I was dealing with 12 hours of jet lag to come back and train for four/five weeks later and then go back to Europe for some more and to put in perspective it was very frustrating with my 50m freestyle time,“ explained Bovell III, who presented his World Championship bronze medal to his coach of 11 years, Minister of Sport Anil Roberts, as a gift. “My best time from the World Cup would have came second and the time was repeating over and over would have been third and my rival Anthony Ervin (USA) stole that medal from me. So you can imagine how that felt.
“In the 100m IM I knew it was not going to be easy and I knew I had to dig deep. To tell you the truth it hurt so bad and I knew I had to put so much energy into it. “I remember walking down the stairs and being relieved that it was over and I had so much physical pains, headaches, and my legs wanted to give out when I was coming down the stairs.  “And to put it in perspective, it had been a long season for me and to know that I had posted a time in Berlin, Germany, that would have actually won the event.  “But it keeps me hungry for next time because you know you had it and you got a glimpse and next time and finally T&T had won a medal.
With regards to the high expectations on him, the soft-spoken Bovell said, “People in T&T seem to expect gold medals all the time, but we are just 1 million people and we are up against one billion in China toiling hard; Russians, who have very hard lives and know swimming is their only way out; Germans, and other big countries with lots of money; and here we are, small T&T on the big stage competing against the world and consistently beating them and being on medal podiums. “My coach Minister Roberts gave you the details of how it went down and overall I am very happy and proud to represent T&T and very grateful for the opportunity to continue to do so and I hope to continue to do it in the future.
Source: www.guardian.co.tt