When I accepted the invitation to write this column, it was my intention not to come across as an expert but rather to share some insight that might hopefully help someone somewhere. This week however, with the looming FINA World Long Course Swimming Championships in Barcelona fast approaching and my main race, the 50 metres freestyle just seven days away, I can’t think of anything more pertinent to write about than this. The hand of fate is on me now as I head to Barcelona to face my destiny tomorrow.
Exactly ten years ago I was doing the same thing. In 2003, I went to the World Championships that coincidentally were held in Barcelona at this same time of year to represent the red, white and black as a medal contender having recently broken onto the world scene by placing fourth in the 2001 World Long Course Championships and seventh in the 2002 World Short Course Championships.
Unfortunately, that year I had to settle for fifth in the world. Now, as a veteran, I am once again returning with a chance for glory.
Some people might think that I am coming full circle. A circle is just two dimensional. It is true that I am circling. However, I envision this to be more of a three dimensional spiral, having circled around in line with the same place as ten years ago, but now on a higher level, with ten years’ more experience, personal growth, insight and accolades earned by relentlessly striving to represent Trinidad and Tobago despite the obvious challenges at this highest level in the crucible that is being a fixture at the top of international sport.
After a year of sacrifice, changes, and a regime of grueling hard work that few can relate to, I believe that this year I can be faster than I have ever been before. Will it be fast enough to get to the top of the podium? Therein lies the drama of sport. That’s why we put ourselves to the ultimate test to seek the ultimate truth. Can I do it? If it was a sure thing there would be no competition, instead the medals would just be mailed out.
The past two weeks in training have been what we call in swimming, the taper.
Every day gets progressively easier with the intention of allowing the body to recover from the months of hard work, while retaining the gained strength, speed and fitness. At this point, the hay should be in the barn so to speak. You must have faith in the work that you have done. Too much training now won’t make you any better, just more tired at the competition.
It takes an experienced athlete and coach to trust the taper process and rest, to abstain from hard work in spite of the building excitement. Inexperience may lead an athlete or coach to doubt the necessity of the rest and compel them to constantly test their form to ascertain if they are on track, which ironically leads to a poor final performance.
Every athlete knows that this taper period is the calm before the storm. As soon as they step on that plane for the flight to the venue, the intensity and speed of the inevitable flow of life’s events seems to pick up. This storm that lies ahead is shaping up to be a hurricane. The FINA World Long Course Championships is undoubtedly the single biggest competition of this year, but to up the ante, this then flows straight into the first two stops of the FINA Swimming World Cup in Eindhoven and Berlin.
The World Championships are like a yearly job review with all the pressure of the common entrance examination. I will admit that deep down my biggest fear is of a worst case scenario in which I were to have a less than stellar showing, or fall ill, and have my critics once again calling for my retirement.
Regardless of the result, I believe that my best is still to come and do not intend to retire until I have attained my full potential. I do it for all those people who can’t but wish they could, because I am blessed with the ability and I can, and because it’s a beautiful thing. I am also very grateful that I work hard at something I love. If you are not working hard you don’t deserve to do it.
Unlike ten years ago where I focused on the 200m Individual Medley and the 200m freestyle, the main focus for me at these upcoming World Long Course Champs will be the 50m freestyle, the same as in the London Olympics. This is actually the closest race in all of sport, with the entire final field often squeezed into mere hundredths of seconds.
It never ceases to amaze me that the competitors all come from such different backgrounds, with different training methods, diets, varying strengths and weaknesses, yet are all so close. This race is also exceptionally cruel, with glory and heartbreak separated by fingertips and less than the blink of an eye. These margins provoke you despite winning or losing to think long and hard about “what if?”
This drama—coupled with the fact that the top contenders in the 50m freestyle are some of the most physically gifted individuals on the planet, all exceptionally strong and athletic with the average height of a final field being around six foot six inches tall—makes for a very popular spectator event.
Just like with track and field, there is something very special about the profound simplicity of being the fastest human being.
Being an athlete is a process. It is always a work in progress, it is never final, the most important results are always the ones from the next competition. A great athlete is always analysing and learning from past performances, both good and bad. There is never a perfect race. Something can always be improved upon, strengths need to be made more powerful and weaknesses must be addressed and compensated for.
This season, I took the opportunity to experiment with some new training methods and philosophies. I could be onto something. It may be risky, but I had to make some changes. The year after the Olympics is the best time to do such things.
How could I continue to do the exact same thing and expect different results? For this season, after participating in an antimalarial and drowning initiative in Uganda I returned to my pre-Olympic training base at the University of Michigan. I resumed working with coaches Mike Bottom and Mark Hill and sought input from the one constant in my swimming career this past decade, Anil Roberts. I set forth on a programme that emphasised sustainable speed, recovery from hard work, and focused on swimming fast all year long in practice as opposed to the traditional approach of just at the end of the season.
I might add that so far this year, I am undefeated in competition. I have also been inspired by, and have adopted elements of the Ido Portal method of movement development and have become an advocate of the paleo diet. I now have greater mobility and I am the strongest that I have ever been in my life. We will see if that counts for something in Barcelona.
Representing T&T in swimming has always made me feel like the underdog against the traditional swimming powerhouses from the developed world that tend to look down upon us with a condescending attitude. It has given me great satisfaction to shake up their preconceived notions for the past 12 years that I have been in the world’s top 10. Once again, this time, I find myself in the comfortable, familiar position of waiting patiently just outside of the spotlight. It took a car accident and a bruise on my brain to bring me face to face with the prospects of losing this, to really make me appreciate these opportunities, and to inspire me to race every race like it’s my last, because one never knows...