Learning to be a fish (Part 2)

Julie had her first ever swim meet last night.  It was a nice evening at an outdoor pool and it went spectacularly well.  She swam in 3 individual events and 2 relays (pretty hefty schedule for someone who has only been swimming with a team for a week!).

The league puts you in an age group based on your age as of June 1, so even though Julie will be 9 on Sunday, she gets to swim in the 8 & under category all season.  Yay!

The results?

• 1st in 25m Butterfly
• 2nd in 25m Freestyle
• 3rd in 25m Backstroke (very close to being 2nd in this race)
• 1st in the mixed age IM relay. Just in case you're not up on "swim speak," I'll translate. This race had a girl from the 14 & under age group, one from the 12 & under, one from the 10 & under and one from the 8 & under.  They each swam a different stroke.  Julie was the youngest, swimming in the 8 & under group.  She swam the freestyle leg in this race and she was the last swimmer in the relay, the anchor.  The coach could choose which swimmer swam each stroke, so Julie did not swim her leg against other 8 & under kids, just against whoever that team had for freestyle.  (You'll see that in the video below.)
• She also swam in a 10 & under freestyle relay and her team did not place, but, since this is my blog and I can brag on my kids if I want to, it wasn't her fault at all that she didn't win.  The girl before her lost a LOT of time.

But the best result?

She had a BLAST!!

Julie had been worried all day about the meet and about competing.  She was so nervous on the way there that I thought she might lose her dinner.  But, thankfully, she had such a good time that she's willing to do it again.  Yay!!

I took a couple videos while we were there.  This one is the first race she was in, the 25m Freestyle. For this race, she is starting at far end and swimming towards the camera.  (Sorry about the shakiness on the video.  People kept walking by and bumping my arm.)

This last video is of Julie's last race, the mixed age IM relay, where each leg of the relay swims a different stroke.  She's starting on our end and swimming away from the camera.  You can't see it well on here, but it was a close race there at the end and Julie pulled out a win!



I'm so happy that she had a good time.  We were all exhausted by the time we drove the hour back home, but happy.  I am definitely looking forward to our next meet being at our pool, only 10 minutes away.  We'll know what to expect then and be more prepared.

What about you?  Are you trying something new this summer?