ANNA ARVIK Members of the UCLA swim team will compete in
the Southern Methodist University Classic and USD swim meet this
weekend.
By Calley Prezzano
Daily Bruin Contributor
This weekend the UCLA women’s swimming and diving squad
plans to divide and conquer as it splits and competes in its second
meet of the season.
Half the team will be flying to Dallas to compete in the
Southern Methodist University Classic, while the rest travels down
to San Diego to face off against the University of San Diego and
Boston College.
Swimming against the Bruins at the SMU Classic will be host SMU,
Auburn, Miami, Pacific and Rice. According to UCLA head coach Cyndi
Gallagher, it will be good for the team to swim against teams with
varying race technique not always seen on the West Coast.
“It is important to see new styles, ideas, and swim
against new faces,” Gallagher said.
The other teams are not simply different from UCLA; they are,
more importantly, powerful. SMU is always a strong team and Auburn
has a chance to be the national champions.
Only eight swimmers and one diver were selected by UCLA coaches
to swim in Dallas this weekend. They must be versatile, because
each swimmer has to compete in three events, as well as relays to
help the team score high.
Senior Elvira Fischer, juniors Erin Zehntner, sophomores Cathy
Coler, Kristen Lewis, Jackie Lobdell, Sara Platzer and Katie
Winkelhaus, freshman Malin Svahnstrom and junior diver Heidi
Prosser were chosen by coaches to compete in the SMU Classic for
their versatility
The pool will be indoors, and the squad will be competing late
at night: a disadvantage for the Bruins. That environment is
something they aren’t accustomed to. The team practices and
competes at Men’s Gym Pool on campus, a completely opposite
setting.
On the other hand, the USD meet will be outdoors, in forecasted
cold weather. This atmosphere will better prepare the swimmers for
upcoming meets against Pac-10 teams, which will mostly be outside
in unpredictable weather.
On top of the weather factor, the Bruins will have to deal with
fatigue.
“We’re tired,” sophomore Chelsea Murray said.
“But we can’t let that get in the way of what we want
this season. We need to learn to race fast when we’re
tired.”
Training has been extremely hard, and will continue to grow in
yardage and intensity until November. At that time, the team will
start resting for meets and begin to cut back on the immense
physical strain of workouts.
Until then, there is no mercy. For the next month, each swimmer
should gain more power as well as improve their technique.
To assist in this development, individual swimmers’ races
have been taped, and can be watched and critiqued with help of
coaches during the day.
“We need to work on the details of racing,”
Gallagher said. “You can’t do that until you see the
race.”
According to Gallagher, racing this weekend will focus on
confidence. No matter which meet the swimmers attend, they also
need to trust the program and swim through the meet, still keeping
their eyes on the end of the season.
Do all of the swimmers realize this yet?
“They’ll figure it out,” Gallagher said.