PICTURES / VIDEO

The meet started today.  We ate continental breakfast at the hotel at 6:15am and headed to the pool.  Warmups at Nationals is pretty packed, as you could guess.  The meet has over 1,300 kids entered, and over 150 teams.  The doors open at 5:45am, and teams line up outside way earlier than that just to scope out and save deck space to sit during the meet.  We only have 3 swimmers, so we were able to squeeze into a cozy spot after warmups to play some cards and a game called Mancala while we waited for our first events.  Murphy was hard to beat...

Our first event was the 50 Breast.  Ben and Murphy both swam and they both achieved best times.  Ben swam a 34.61 and Murphy got a 33.75.  Our next event was the 50 Free, which Ben and Keegan swam.  Ben got another best time at 26.45 and Keegan was a little off his best at 27.11.  It's a challenge for kids to do well at their first big meet like Y Nationals.  Nerves get worked up, and there's a lot of new things happening to distract your focus.  That's one reason I'm doing this journal, to help kids get an idea of what Nationals is like to help make the meet more familiar before kids get here.  Please let me know if there's something more I can do to document the experience.  I have video of the boys' swims today, but I will need more time to get it uploaded.

After prelims, we hit Smoothie King and ate lunch at Jimmy John's.  Then it was back to the hotel to relax a bit.  The boys still hadn't thought of how to dress up for the Opening Ceremonies parade, so they went out to grab some things for a costume.  They came back with lamp shades.......

Each Nationals meet has a theme (this year is Olympic Celebration), and the meet always begins with Open Ceremonies just before finals on the first day of the meet.  During open ceremonies, kids parade around the pool deck wearing costumes that go along with the meet's theme.  There is often a guest speaker to give a devotion, or else a swimmer from one of the teams writes a devotion.  The National Anthem is sung and then the place breaks loose to the YMCA Song by the Village People.  This year, before the YMCA Song, a 50 meter event for a group of Special Olympics swimmers ran while all the swimmers were still lined up around the pool in their costumes.  The place got very loud cheering them on.

Anyway, since the Olympics are held in Beijing this year, Ben, Murphy, and Keegan tried to dress in Chinese customs.  The lamp shades were painted black and were supposed to be Chinese hats.  They looked a little silly...felt even more silly, but not as goofy as some of the other costumes.  I don't have any pictures, but the YMCA Nationals website should post pictures within the next day or two.

After opening ceremonies, the kids put in another warmup and then we headed to dinner.  We ate at a place that had replicas of old fighter jets around the restaurant (very fitting for our team).

Tomorrow is an off day.  We will not compete in any events.

Click to enlarge each photo.

Videos of Ben, Murphy, & Keegan's swims today will be uploaded later.