2016 Regional Meet

On January 30 Logan High swam in the regional swim meet.  Ethan did a great job and had his best times of the season.  We took the whole family to cheer him on.

After a tough day of swimming the Logan High Swim Team ended up the Region Champions!

Ethan finished 7th in the region and 49th in the state in the 100 yard fly!  He ended up with a time of 1:04.41.  He finished 6th in the region for the 100 yard backstroke but, he got disqualified on a turn.  He was so disappointed but it happens.

It was a fun day and a great season!  Ethan made so much progress thanks to his hard work and great coaching!

Brian Kawamura, Ethan Edwards, CJ Visick

Ethan's final times:

100 yard fly 1:04.41

100 yard back 1:10.95

200 yard IM 2:34.89

Brian Kawamura & Ethan

Way to go Ethan on such a great season!

What a Difference a Year Makes!

I can not believe it has been a year since I have posted anything!  What have I been doing??

Ethan is now on the Logan High School Swim Team.  He loves it!!  It's been an amazing experience for him and I couldn't be happier.  But, let's start from the beginning.

Before swim season I had talked with some parents who had kids on the swim team in previous seasons.  They all had the same things to say.  They loved having their kids on the team but didn't like the coach.  They didn't think he was doing a good job, they didn't think he was responsible, and they all wished there was a different coach.  Hmmmmm, not what I wanted to hear.

Ethan and I went to a swim meet just to check out the coach and the team.  I was NOT impressed.  The coach just sort of was there.  He really didn't do any coaching that I could see.

So I was a little apprehensive sending Ethan to the first day of swim practice.  Little did I know the coach had quit that morning.  Yep, prayers are answered!  Ethan can home from practice so excited that his new coach was actually his old swim club coach, Emily Monroe-Jones.

Emily was a swim team captain at the University of Utah and recently had been training triathletes and coaching the Barracuda club swim team.  She also pulled together a couple assistant coaches; Meghan O'very, who holds some state high school swim records, and Megan Healy.  So I knew Ethan was going to be in good hands.

Emily, Meghan, Ethan, Megan

Logan High swim team had a great season!  They ended up being the Region Champions!  But, more important than that, the kids had a great time!  Ethan loved making new friends, working hard, and seeing great improvements in himself.  The coaches really pushed the kids at practices.  They worked extremely hard.  They also did some really fun Saturday activities and had team dinners the night before each meet.

Colter, CJ, Brian, & Ethan

Who knew going into the season it would turn out so great?!  Ethan is already looking forward to next season.  Well, maybe right after he takes a little break!

Gator vs. Barracuda Duel Meet Jan. 23, 2015

For some reason our swim team loves to have dual meets with the Gator swim team.  I'm not thrilled with swimming against the same kids over and over again so we don't usually attend these meets.  However, Ethan is really close to qualifying for the State Jr Olympics so we thought he could get in some more times to try and qualify.

He could only enter 3 events so he chose the 50 yard free style, 100 yard breast stroke, and the 100 yard butterfly.

In the 50 yard free he was only about 4 seconds away from qualifying but he hadn't swum that event in about a year.  Most meets only offer kids his age the 100 yard free.  The state qualifying time is 25:96 seconds.  Here is his race.  He's in lane 6.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUP6JJjPvUE

He is about 3 1/2 seconds away from qualifying.  So close!!!

He wanted to try the 100 yard breast stroke because he has never tried it...ever!  The breast stroke has been a problem for him but he has finally worked it out and felt comfortable competing in it.  The state qualifying time is 1:15.73.  Here is that race.  He's in the far lane, lane 1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qNtBh0CZaDE

His time was 1:34.70 so he's got some work there to do but not bad for a first try.

His butterfly didn't come out well.  He actually added 7 seconds to his time which is not good at all.  He has developed a very bad habit of pulling his body up toward the ceiling instead of propelling himself forward.  The state qualifying time is 1:06.60  Here is that race.  He's in lane 4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzrAZeacNLg

His time was 1:27.04 but his best time is 1:20.85

It was a nice short meet and he is getting really close on his 50 yard free.  He'll have lots of things to work on the next time we meet with Alissa.

Coaches and Swimmers and Teams, Oh My!

(First of all the intent of this post is not to cut anyone down.  I have withheld names of coaches so as not to give the impression otherwise.  I will give credit where credit is due but I don't intend to bash anyone here.  I simply want to document Ethan's journey and part of that is changing teams and the reasoning behind those changes.  If there is one thing I have learned it's that each kid and each coach come with their own personality and different things work for different people.  I do appreciate everyone that has been a part of Ethan's journey.)

Ethan began swimming on the YMCA team in Norfolk, Nebraska called the Aquajets.  It was a good little team and the coach was really fun and had a good relationship with his swimmers.  Ethan was really taught some good fundamentals.  He had learned all of the strokes except the Breast Stroke before we found out that we were moving to Utah.

Head Coach  Dave Nelson, Ethan, and assistant coach Jake of the Aquajets 2011

I did a little research and found out that Cache Valley, Utah, where we would be moving, had 3 club swim teams.  I sent e-mails to all three teams and only heard back from one.  The Logan Gator Swim Team sent an e-mail back and said they would be happy to have Ethan on the team and looked forward to meeting him.  So, after our move to Utah we went and met the Gator coaches and Ethan did a swim test and was put on the Silver team.  I spoke with the coaches about the fact that he was just learning the Breast Stroke and they assured me that they recognized he needed help with it and they would work with him on it.

We spent a year on the Gator team.  After that year Ethan could still not do the breast stroke.  I was frustrated!  How could a kid who was winning races in the Butterfly not be able to do the Breast Stroke?!  I had talked with the coaches multiple times and nothing was happening.  There were also a couple other incidences where coaches were just not coaching.  It was a pretty laid back environment which is fine for some swimmers but Ethan really wanted to be winning races and progressing and he just wasn't.  He got to the point where he was actually adding time to his races.

Gator Swim-A-Thon 2013

We decided to make a change and we went to look at the Barracuda Swim Team.  The head coach talked with me for a while, watched Ethan swim, and then talked with me some more about the plan for Ethan.  He put Ethan in the Silver group with the promise they would work on his Breast Stroke and in a month or six weeks move him right up to the Gold team.  The coach had some great things to say about Ethan and recognized him as a good swimmer who should be winning races.

I will just say now that the coach said all the right things to me.  Your kid is great.  He is going to be great with our help.  He will be a top swimmer.  Yada yada yada.  Just what I needed to hear.  So we made the switch and put Ethan on the Barracuda team.

After 6 months on the team Ethan still couldn't do the Breast Stroke!  We were promised a move up to the gold team which never happened and suddenly the team wasn't going to any meets.  What was going on with this team?  I started to feel like the nagging mother that no one wanted to talk to.  I started to get no answers to my e-mails and when I did get an answer I just got excuses.  So, after the Utah Summer Games meet I was more than ready to jump ship and try the one and only team left in the valley to try, the Cache Valley Marlins.

I contacted the Marlins head coach and asked if Ethan could come and try out their team.  She said that would be fine and so we went.  About this same time the Barracuda team reorganized and got a couple new coaches and Ethan was moved up to the gold team.  I went and met Ethan's new coach, Dani Harding and she seemed great.  She knew who Ethan was, discussed specifically what he was working on, and how to get him to the next level.  Wow!  I liked her.  Ethan was saying really great things about her after practices too so I could tell she was really coaching and on top of things.

Ethan did go and swim with the Marlins a couple times and liked that coach fine.  She seemed overwhelmed with all the swimmers and the practice times conflicted with our school schedule.  Ethan made the decision to stay on the Barracuda team.  I talked with him about what I saw were the pros and cons of making the switch but he made the decision and I have to say I think he made the right one.  He has made a lot of progress in the last few months.

Ethan also started meeting with Alissa Wallace, the coach we met at the Utah Summer Games.  She has been fantastic for him!!  He meets with her once a week for an hour just one on one and you really can't beat that.  She is really fixing all of his little stroke problems and bad habits.

Ethan watching films with Alissa during practice

I think it's really hard as a parent to navigate for your children.  Ethan wants to be a collegiate swimmer and he is working hard to meet that goal.  As a mom I want him to have every opportunity to get there.  But what do you do when you live in a very small valley with very limited choices?  I feel blessed that there are at least multiple teams here to choose from but what do you do when they all seem to be mediocre?  I don't want to have to tell my kid that he can't have his dream because of where we live.

You go get your dream, Ethan! 

Utah Summer Games 2014

Ethan's team decided to go to the Utah Summer Games in 2014 to compete.  The Utah Summer Games is a great event that lasts about 2 weeks each summer down in Cedar City, Utah.  Athletes from all over the state compete in over 30 sports. We thought it would be fun to take Ethan down.

It was a grand event!  Upon arrival we got Ethan checked in for his swim meet and then headed to the opening ceremonies.  They were so fun.  The athletes got to march into the stadium just like real Olympians.  There was a torch lighting, fireworks, and a great band.  What a way to start off the events!

Everything seemed to be so well organized and the facilities were great.

Todd and I had a wonderful time being with Ethan.  We left the other kids at home with grandma and grandpa so it was just the three of us.  

The meet was an eye opener for us and for Ethan.  We had no idea what the competition would be like and it was tough!  We mostly swim against the same three teams up here in Cache Valley.  It seems no one but me wants to travel anywhere and swim against anyone else!  It's been frustrating for me.  So we weren't really sure what the state of the other teams in Utah were.  We quickly found out that swimming in the rest of the state is much different and a lot tougher.

Some of the teams were just amazing to watch.  The Olympus Aquatics team had some amazing swimmers on it and the coaches were fun to watch.  Those kids hit the pool and it was all business.

Our coach on the other had was late to the first day of the meet, sat his butt in the corner and never did anything.  He didn't even show up to the second day of the meet.  I WAS FURIOUS!!  I couldn't believe a coach would take the team all the way down there and then do NOTHING!  I was ready to leave the team after that meet but I guess that's another blog post.

There was lots of sitting around and waiting time.  The second day of the meet we waited 4 hours before Ethan's first event!  That's right, 4 hours!  The kids have to be there to check in for warm-ups and you don't know when their events are scheduled until the meet begins so there was no getting around it.  Well, while we were waiting on the first day we started talking with this lady next to us.  As we talked with her we found out she was the coach of the Cedar City Stingrays.  Her name was Cathy Wallace.  She was so nice to us and asked about Ethan and some of his times.  We mentioned that our coach was missing and how disappointed we were in our team and she totally took Ethan under her wing.  Even though she had tons of her own kids to coach she took in Ethan too.  She watched his strokes during warm-ups and gave him some pointers and things to work on.  She also watched his starts and after each race she would come over to us and ask what his time was and how he did.  I couldn't believe how wonderful she was.  Here I was so discouraged about our coach and she just stepped right in to help.

As we got to know Cathy over the 2 days of meets we found out her daughter had been a State ranked swimmer and her son, currently in high school, was also a State Champion swimmer. Apparently it runs in the family.  The best news we found out was that her daughter, Alissa, attends Utah State University in Logan, Ut.  That's right!!  She lives right in our hometown while she goes to school.  Not only was Alissa a State swimmer, she also helped her mom coach the Stingrays.  Well we jumped all over that.  We met Alissa at the meet and arranged for her to be Ethan's private swim coach!

How lucky was that meeting?!  If we hadn't started chatting with Cathy and if she hadn't been so nice to us and Ethan we would have never found such a great coach for him!!

So we left the Summer Games discouraged and encouraged.  Discouraged because we recognized that with Ethan's current team and coach we just couldn't even compete with the other swimmers in Utah but encouraged because maybe this would be a new beginning for us with a new coach.

All in all the Utah Summer Games were an eye opener, a dose of reality, but really fun!

On the road to Cedar City, Ut!

Keep swimming Ethan!  You're going to make it!

How It All Began

Ethan's beginning in swimming happened sort of by chance.  We were living in Norfolk, Nebraska and he needed something to do after school.  He had just entered middle school and he was getting all of his homework done at school.  He would come home and have nothing to do so he wanted to sit in front of the TV or play video games all afternoon.  NOT what I wanted him to do.  So, I began looking for some sort of activity that he could do after school.

Right next door to the middle school was the local YMCA.  They had a little swim team called the Aquajets.  We decided to let Ethan try it for a couple weeks to see what he thought about it.  HE LOVED IT!  Everyday he would walk from the school to the Y for practice and then I would pick him up before dinner.  It was perfect.  He got some exercise and all I had to do was pick him up.

I assumed he would do it for a few months or a year and then get tired of it and find something else to do.  WRONG!  He just kept doing it and getting better and better and never got tired of it.  After a while he moved up through the ranks and it was time to start swimming at meets.  We knew nothing about swimming!  I knew the names for the strokes but that's about it.  We didn't know the difference between Long Course and Short Course, what an IM was, nothing!  So, we went to the first meet and started asking everyone and anyone lots of questions.  We learned as we went.  We're still learning!

I have to say I was greatly impressed at that first meet.  The sportsmanship those kids and coaches showed was impressive!  Everyone cheered for each other, the coaches weren't yelling at the kids, when someone got disqualified no one yelled at the refs.  Impressive!  There was even a little boy who could hardly swim from one end of the pool to the other.  Everyone cheered and cheered until he finally made it to the other end of the pool.  Now that's the kind of sport I want my kid to be a part of!!!

Ethan at his first swim meet in Norfolk, NE

Ethan's Beginning

Last night I took my son Ethan on a date night.  It's something we try to do at our house to give us time with each of our kids.  It's fun to see them grow and mature and I want to have a close relationship with each of them.

Logan High School swim team was having a fund raiser.  They showed the movie "Touch the Wall".  It's a documentary of Missy Franklin's and Kara Joyce's road to the 2012 London Olympics.  Very interesting contrast between the two.  Both on the same road but very differing experiences.

Anyway, it inspired me to document Ethan's road.  He has come a long way in swimming, he loves it, and who know where it will lead.  It doesn't really matter to me where it leads but I think it will be fun for him to look back.