Drag Suit

John knew next to nothing when he began his career in year-round swimming. Each year brought some new piece of knowledge or revelation about the sport. Jean and I knew less than John did, so we were of little use to him other than driving and paying the bills. All swimming knowledge came from outside the family from coaches, other swimmers, or parents of swimmers. It was amusing how many times John, Jean and I would look at each other with expressions that said, “I didn’t know that!” We had one of those moments at the Senior Region meet in 2000.

John had a good coach and improved continuously throughout his swimming career. In the spring of 2000 John qualified for the Senior Region meet in South Carolina. (It wasn’t his first time at Region) At that meet he was shooting for qualifying times for the Junior Nationals swim meet, and was successful in the 500, 1000, and 1650 yard freestyle. The qualifying times for Junior Nationals were extremely fast that few swimmers could accomplish.

At the conclusion of the 1650 Coach Hugh stopped by the warm-down pool to talk over the split times with John. Hugh was visibly agog at the swimsuits John had worn during the race. John was wearing two old ratty suits that would qualify as “drag” suits, and Hugh had a good laugh. “I’ve never seen a kid swim Junior National times while racing in drag suits”. It was quite an accomplishment to swim Junior National qualifying times, but to do it while handicapped by a drag suit was doubly difficult. Hugh was basically saying “who knows how fast this kid could have gone in the proper swimsuit.”

Apparently John’s suits were insufficient for racing at this level. Jean and I didn’t know that suits were important. One of us surely said for the umpteenth time, “I didn’t know that!” After that we paid better attention to keeping John supplied with proper swim gear. Actually, we pestered John regularly because he wasn’t as diligent as he could have been about letting us know his equipment needs. Was that cryptic enough? He got better at this over time.