Swimmer of the Week for December 16th – 21st, 2013:
Intro to Nitro
Cedar Park: Nate Thomas – Nate has been reaching new heights with us in Intro! He is always eager to demonstrate the drills to the class…and his butterfly drills/swim looked awesome in practice! He is always determined to swim the best he can and he never quits. He has improved immensely in Intro. Way to go Nate, keep up the good work!! – Coach Kirsten
Bee Cave: Faith Richmond – Faith had her best practices this week. She listened to her coaches all week and showed what she can really do. She really showed improvement this week and we are very proud of here. Keep up the great work Faith. – Coach Nikki
Bronze
Cedar Park: Ella Baldwin – One of the best qualities a swimmer can have is perseverance. Ella was out sick with a respiratory infection for quite awhile. These two factors made her return very difficult. After a tough couple of weeks she has managed to push herself all the way to the front of her lane throughout practice. I hope you continue to use your ability to persevere through challenges for a long time to come. Congratulations and keep up the hard work. – Coach Travis
Bee Cave: Keiyan Daily – He has tries for months now to be swimmer of the week. This week however he tired very hard to get his breast stroke down because that is his weak stroke and he finally did it. Not only did he get the stroke down. He show leadership, taking lead in the lane, asked questions and eager to learn. I love it when a swimmer show me improvement and want to learn. I’m very proud of him. – Coach Tanner
Technique & Fitness
Cedar Park: Valerie Luu & Ethan Gonzalez – Valerie really rocked her breaststroke this past week. Every time she swam her medley relay breaststroke leg she dominated. Ethan was a great sport helping out our medley relay team since we were short a swimmer. Great job you two thanks for being a part of NITRO and we’ll see you at the pool. – Coach Steve
Bee Cave: Julie Chen – Julie did an outstanding job this week with our tough kick sets this week. She had a huge smile for the entire duration of practice. Julie brings a lot of energy to the group that everyone feeds off of. Great job this week Julie! – Coach Adrian
Silver
Cedar Park: Julia Rautaneva & Adadhitha Kannan – Both swimmers have been steadily putting in great work over the past few weeks, and both really stood out on our big freestyle workout to wrap up this week’s practices. When the group was asked to swim 8 x 100s at a challenging pace Julia stepped up to the challenge and managed to get faster the longer the set went on. Addy has been swimming with some real fire over the past few weeks, and had a standout performance on the same set of 100s. Keep up the great work you two! – Coach Dakota
Bee Cave: Robert Schaab II – Day after day Robert does the job, so what is the job, tight streamlines, eagerness, strong underwater push offs, smiles, great focus, desire, and a feel for the water that has improved one thousand percent. All of this happens because he loves DOING THE JOB! This young man is having fun while he is learning to swim better and faster, and fun is what keeps it light, he can handle any amount of pain with a smile and a laugh. Great job Robert!! – Coach Chuck
Advanced Silver
Cedar Park: Mater McCusker – Mater is very attentive and has put lots of effort into improving his strokes and his ability to use his snorkel. He has been the first one in every practice this week. It’s important to establish good habits early and Mater is on the ball! – Coach Alex
Bee Cave: Devyn Hantgin – Many times, when honoring a Swimmer of the Week, I focus on qualities like attitude, concentration or sportsmanship. But let us not forget that swimming is also about pushing ourselves to achieve our physical limits. It is not easy to ask that of ourselves. It hurts. Pain is something we grow up rejecting. “If something is painful, don’t do it”, is the lesson we learn from the first time we touch something hot or fall and skin our knee. It takes thought and reason to see what pain is to be avoided and what pain is to be embraced. As athletes we embrace pain everyday, breaking down our muscles so they can grow back stronger and more resilient. This week the Adv. Silver swimmers had the opportunity to push themselves to their limits. We had many great efforts from both groups, however, Devyn’s achievements stood out. Pushing through the pain, Devyn demonstrated to the coaches, her teammates and most importantly, herself, the progress she has made and the hidden depths within her. I look forward to seeing her realize her true strength. Keep up the great work Devyn! – Coach Jeff
Gold
Cedar Park: Max Vinnik – Max had a really great week swimming an amazing set of 200s Freestyle. We challenged the group to see how many 200s they could complete on a 2:45 interval, many swimmers made the interval. Max really went to town on this set getting faster on every single 200 getting up to 20 seconds rest on most of his swims. Keep up the hard work Max! – Coach Flo
Bee Cave: Joe Gillett – Joe was out of the water here for a week due to a vacation but that didn’t keep him from training. While he was gone his family took him to a local YMCA where he was able to get in and warm up several times the week he was gone. Upon his return to practice Joe forgot his sneakers for dry land on the second day back. He said he had borrowed his “sisters” shoes in order for him to participate but I found out later he actually dug a pair out of the lost and found. Talk about commitment and motivation! Great effort Joe! Keep it up! – Coach Hannah