My sister Alana and I cannot sleep a wink. I am busy packing for our swim bags of the necessities for the meet tomorrow. On a usual day we would just pack a bar, Powerade, towel, and a pair of goggles and cap, but tomorrow is not just any meet or practice it is the North Star Summer Swim League Championships! Today our swim bags now have multiple towels, sports drinks, extra caps, extra goggles, an extra bathing suit, sharpies, flip flops, team shirts, pumping music, and a good attitude! We are practically bouncing off the walls in our excitement because Alana is swimming in a senior relay! Eventually my mom forces us in our pajamas and gets us to brush our teeth. Tomorrow is a big day for me, my sister, my friends, and also my team.
As soon as I step onto the pool deck at Huntersville Family Fitness Aquatics (HFFA) I take a deep breath and smell the chlorine filled air. I can feel my competitive instincts kicking in and I sit to take my seat as I watch the 10 and under kids pile in through the doors. Allyson my best friend and her cousin Christina sit with me while we wait for our siblings to finish with their meet. Aaden, Allysons younger brother swims with Alana, my sister. Alana is in the same relay as Adeline, my carpools sister and they are all very fast. When I cheer for their relay I rejoice at the thought of our relay swimming and people cheering for us the same way. Once the relay finished and they got first place in their heat I gave Adeline and Alana a hug. I heard them sigh and tipped my head down to ask, "what's wrong?!" They said ," the water is really cold and you are really warm." I laugh and giggle as the squeeze me tighter making my shirt sopping wet.
A little bit after all of the relays finished, Allysons and my family went down to Panera. In an hour span of time Allyson, Christina, Alana, and I all finish and pile into my dads car and he drops everyone off except for Alana at HFFA. Once we take or seats in the bleachers smelling of chlorine, chicken nuggets, and pizza we set our stuff down and Allyson and i got ready for our warmups and waited for our friend Sophie. For the first time in 5 years I can actually rest on the wall during warmups because everyone is usually faster than me, not this year. When we return from warmups we are greeted with a very unpleasant surprise. As we walk back to the bleachers Elan Bookers mom, the meanest person exclaims with so much happiness in her voice ," I thought some teams forfeited and we won the champs! WOOHOO! Nope, " We, as a team have decided we are going to kick all of the highland creek swimmers off the bleachers to make room for the parents and other family members." That was a terrible turn of events, fortunately no other teams were at the diving well. The diving well is an area of the pool where it is 15-17 feet and they have low diving boards, high diving boards, a plank (idk what it's for but I think you must walk the plank if you are bad), and 3 high podium diving boards, the top one is at least 10 meters but I wouldn't know I'm a swimmer not a diver.
Once all the Highland Creek Swimmers trekked their way towards the well me and my friends set our stuff down on the plank. I sat at the very end and made sure all electronic devices were out of sight and protected by waterproof cases just in case my bag falls into the pool. Once my friends and I jumped into the well and stretched or cold muscles, we walked over to the event seating benches and listened to the national anthem. Hanani's Mom lined us up in our lanes and heats for our relays after the national anthem. We left to line up in our relays, lane #5, heat #2, event #5 11-12 girls 200 medley relay.
As Hannah prepared herself on the block we heard the official begin the starting procedures we heard the buzzer go off and Hannah push off the wall with as much force as an ax on wood, and Hannah was off on her way for backstroke. As soon as Hannah touched the wall Sophie made a break for it, she was a little slow when she ended the breaststroke today which puts a little behind but I know I can catch us up. I tighten my goggles and I put my first foot on the starting block stair and push the goggles into my eyes as I step up to the block. My eyes peeled for Sophie's hands on the wall. Her hands touch the wall and I push of the block with so much I can feel the water bubble around me as I dive in. All I feel are my arms pushing through the water all around me and my head popping up every once in a while fora breath in butterfly. I love the fact there is barely any noise just the muffled cheers and splashing water. As I start to close in on the girl in the lane beside me giving Jaden, the freestyle anchor a good 1 foot head start. When Jaden launched off the block and broke into freestyle I knew this was it. The water splashing around us made it hard to see, but our team knew when Jaden touched the wall. Our relay team peered at the scoreboard and we clapped and hugged an squealed because we got Blue, First, Uno, the best number! We pulled Jaden out of the pull and squeezed in for a group hug until the timers in our lane told us to move. At the end of the champs, not to our surprise we won! Highland Creek Hurricanes swim team was going crazy we pushed the coaches into the pool and started our winning streak once again.
This story goes out to my swim team thank you for teaching me all that i know now.
