Swimming masterfully
The USU swim team operates under the U.S. Masters Swimming organization, which allows for students and non-students alike to participate, as long as they are 18 years or older. There are 31 swimmers on the team, three of which are non-students.
JP Parrish, USU’s swim team head coach, said the masters team gives swimmers a foundation to support fitness and competition goals.
“I especially like the masters program for the lifelong fitness and competition values,” Parrish said. “Swimmers of all ages can choose to keep fit through their choice of competitive swimming and through group workouts. A person can decide how dedicated to competition they want to be.”
Non-student swimmers Marion Murray, Anna Marie Forest and Steven Camicia have all agreed, they’re not in it as much for the competition but because of their love for swimming – it’s a lifetime sport.
“I go jogging, and I even bought a nice road bike to go cycling,” Murray said. “I enjoy those things, but it’s not really the same. I always go back to swimming. Swimming, I can just go and go, and I love it.”
Murray, who is originally from North Carolina, said she moved to Logan five years ago and worked for USU to coordinate the Utah Integrated Pest Management program. Murray said now she primarily works through the Extension Office with state fruit tree growers and, on occasion, gives guest lectures.
This semester, Murray said she’s taking a break from swimming because of an impingement near her rotator cuff, but she plans to start back up next fall after rehabilitation in her shoulders.
She said she has been on USU’s masters team since it began three years ago.
“I was so excited when it started,” Murray said. “I’ve been swimming my whole life. I did age-group swimming as a kid, and I swam all through high school. I was going to swim for the University of North Carolina, but it didn’t provide the flexibility I wanted. Sometimes I wish I had stuck it out.”
Murray has swum on five different masters teams, including in Rhode Island, Oregon, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and Utah.
“I joined masters mostly because I missed the team sport aspect, and I was incredibly out of shape,” Murray said. “For students the motivation is to get faster – mine is more to stay in shape.”
The Utah State swim program caters to all types of athletes. Parrish said he adjusts workouts based on feedback from both student and non-student swimmers to meet their needs and desires.
Some focus on stroke techniques and others choose to concentrate on improvement in distances or sprints, he said.
“The team is based on the goals that the individual swimmer sets for themselves,” Parrish said. “One swimmer may be training for a triathlon. Two others train for nationals and general fitness. All benefit from the team-driven workouts that try to accomplish training on technique, endurance and general fitness.”
Camicia, an assistant professor in the School of Teacher Education and Leadership, said he joined the USU swim team when it began in the fall of 2009 to train for triathlons.
“I could do distances no problem,” Camicia, a San Francisco native, said. “But I wanted to increase my times. Just practicing by myself didn’t really help a lot. A team – and swimming with people who are younger than you – is very motivating to get the speed up.”
Camicia said he plans to participate in three or four Olympic triathlons this summer, including the Bear Lake Brawl Triathlon in August. He previously swam on three different masters teams in Reno, Nev., Seattle and Salt Lake City.
Currently, he said he competes in the 45-50 age group for USU and prefers to swim distance.
“I swam the 500 in the last swim meet in Salt Lake,” Camicia said. “Then I swam the one-mile in one of our meets before. It’s really long and takes forever, but I’m not really good at sprint. I’m kind of slow and steady.”
Camicia was two minutes from qualifying for the U.S. Masters Swimming spring national championships this year in the mile and is aiming for nationals next year, he said. He shows his dedication by regularly attending four of five swim practices each week.
“The students have shared with me how they look up to these non-students,” Parrish said. “Each of them makes specific arrangements to be part of our team – to get the workout they desire. It’s this drive to stay active in an activity they are passionate about. We are glad to have this group of swimmers with us.”
Forest, who joined the team last fall, said most the time she can keep up with the students during the swim workout, but on occasion she puts fins or paddles on. She currently works for the Utah Department of Natural Resources and Division of Wildlife, testing fish health.
Staying active is something Forest said she values greatly.
“Well, 20 years from now, you will find out that your body hurts,” Forest said. “And it may hurt less if you move it than if you sit on the couch all the time. If I’m inactive, I ache more than if I am active and run and swim. I don’t want to be one of those people that say, ‘I wish I didn’t watch so much TV. I could have done something.'”
Forest grew up in Los Alamos, N.M., and has swum for the past 35 years, she said. Her freshman year of college she swam the breaststroke for New Mexico State University. Besides swimming, she races in half marathons and 5-kilometer foot races, plays racketball and does karate, but she said she always goes back to the pool.
“It’s not that hard on my body,” Forest said. “Sometimes other things are harder. I tear my feet up running, especially doing a half marathon downhill. Your feet ache, your calves are sore, you have missing toenails and all that stuff when you’re done. Swimming, there’s not so much of a pain issue there. Plus I like being in the water. I’m comfortable there – it doesn’t stress me out.”
The team’s next meet is at nationals, which is April 26-29 in Greensboro, N.C. Parrish said only eight team members can go because of funding limitations and were chosen based on attendance requirements, attitude and how fast or how numerous qualifying times were.
“The swim team has grown and matured in the past three years,” Parrish said. “I hope that students will continue to swim and support the team so a lasting legacy of competitive swimming can be built at Utah State. I look forward to the day that Big Blue will join us for a few laps.”
– kristi.j.lambert@aggiemail.usu.edu