The USA National journal, part IIIa

(East Meadow, NY) - Today has been a day 8.5 years in the making. As coaches we sometimes want things to happen 'right now.' I have been waiting for today for about 4 years! We are finally swimming at Nationals, making finals AND acting like we belong there. Its literally the first time since I've arrived in Santa Maria that I have had a group of athletes show up at Nationals and handle it like any other swim meet.

Our day started at 6:20AM with breakfast at the Mario Brother's diner. It's not really called that, but this local diner has two men that work it and they look just like the Super Mario Bros., of Ninetendo fame. By 9:00AM, we were warmed up and ready for the start of the non-distance events at the meet.

Meghan Zimmer started us off, tying her best 100 Freestyle to the 100th in 1:00.21. We were hoping to get under 1:00, but for now its still a great swim. About 30 minutes later, Meghan swam the 200 Backstroke, winning her heat in dominating fashion with a 2:20.62, 2 seconds under her previous best. She misses her Summer National cut by .6 and is now only 3 seconds away from Olympic Trials. Even bigger - she is 14th going into this evening's finals, an SMSC first, at least in the past decade or more.

Rachael Wahl got up in the 'money' heat of the 200 Fly and swam to a 2:17.84, good enough to come back in the bonus final this evening. The time puts her less than a second away from Olympic Trials.

At Nationals, the Time Trial meet can be almost as big and we had some stellar swims there too. Jamie Furber dropped a full second off his 100 Freestyle for a 55.0. Samantha Lougee dropped 2 seconds off her 200 Back to go 2:23, followed by Erica Brannon at 2:25. Its been a great first morning for us.

Its very exciting to have the amazing swims and World records going on in Melbourne right now and feeling connected to that here in New York. It feels a bit like being part of 1000 people all trying to make Olympic Trials together.

We'll have more results posted this evening. Fast swimming to all.