My heart is racing as I am anticipating the whistle to blare into my ears before I can leap into the frigid ice cold water!

The night before my swim meet was like Christmas Eve!  I could barely sleep as I anticipated the sunrise and the drive to my meet.  I told my mom that I was going to shower the night before so I could sleep in longer.  I heard the birds chirping and I knew it was about time to wake up and start to get around!  I thought to myself this will be the first time in a truly long time that my family has to wake up early for a sport that is not my brother’s, (but mine).   My mom had breakfast ready and hollered my name to come down and eat.  I didn’t eat too much though, because I had butterflies in my stomach.  My mom kept on telling me that you will do great ( it did not help).  By the time I got done eating we were out the door and heading up to Wichita.  That was the longest hour and a half of my life.  Our Ford Explorer pulled into the school and many swimmers were heading into the pool.  My parents gave me some words of encouragement, and headed into the pool.  When I stepped in, the smell of chlorine stung my nose, and the humidity fogged up my glasses.  I saw my team (Emporia Aquatic Club) and headed over to our spot.  We watched some of the other competitors compete and then it was an hour until my race. Katlin (my coach) had my team go to the second pool that was for warming up and got our heart rates up and practiced diving off of the block then we had to get out so another team could warm up.  After we practiced she wrote our time on our wrists. Mine was 1:3 meet 1 lane 3.  At that time it was 30 minutes until my race and I was freezing cold on the bleachers.  My mom helped me put up my hair and put on my swim cap.  Then one of my teammates came over and talked to me and said, “once you dive into the water all of the fear melts away” (Kyndel) and that made me feel a whole lot better!  I saw Katlin call me over to her table and she gave me some advice and told me one whistle means step up onto the block, many whistles means get into the your diving position for whatever stroke you are doing (I did the breaststroke), then when the bell sounds you dive in.

There was one race (boys breaststroke) in front of me then it would be the first girls breaststroke.  Katlin told me to start heading over to lane three.  When I was in the swarm of swimmers I realized, “oh my, I’m really little compared to these girls.”  The last boy finished and they got out of the pool and we stepped to the block.  “Tweet” and I knew this is happening and I have to step on the block.  Once everyone was on the block the guy blew his whistle again, “tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet,” and I bent forward into my diving position, my legs were shaking so much I could of fallen off the block.  If I jumped off too early than I could’ve been disqualified.  The guy said are you guys ready and “ding”,  I was off!  Kyndal was right the chilling water melted away my fears!  I was swimming and every time I came up I heard “go Sydney and shoot (word that means go down quick when doing the breaststroke)!  I wanted to see where I was at compared to the other girls but that would slow me down.  I just knew that I was either behind the girls by a lot or ahead of the girls right next to me.  I was close to the wall and was thinking in my head push the wall and turn around.  My legs and arms felt like cooked spaghetti as I was finishing the 50 meters.  I couldn’t handle it so I did a quick look and realized there was only one other person close to me the rest were behind us.  I was close to the end and energy shot threw me and I started to kick extra hard and pull like my life was depending on it.  I saw the platform and I knew I was about to finish.  I was less than 3 feet away and I pushed put my arms and strided to the platform and pushed the platform.  My time went up on the big screen and I thought that I got second place and was happy with that.  We waited for everyone else to finish then we could get out of the water.

 The people in charge said to go back to your team’s table.  When I walked over to the the table, Katlin shouted, “how does it feel to be in first place”!  I couldn’t believe it, I was overjoyed and could not help but squealing (not that loud)!  I beat the other girl only by .20 seconds.  Then I walked back to my family and my mom and dad were so proud of me!  When I sat down my legs were still shaking even though the race was over and I won!  I cheered on my other teammates for awhile then I had to take a shower and get the chlorine out of my hair (or else my hair will turn green).  I got many congratulations by my mom’s friends and my brother’s friends.  Once everyone got done racing we could leave (it was before lunch).  Since I did well I could choose what we were going to eat for lunch.  I adore pasta and I hadn’t had Olive Garden in a while and so that was where we went.  Swimming always works up my appetite and when I am racing, oh boy I ate so much.  After we had a wonderful lunch we went to the mall for awhile.  Then we started to head home.  I still had a huge smile on my face.  

From this event in my life I realized to not doubt myself.  Even if you have never done that thing before (I never did a swim meet before) you could still do great in it.  Even if I got last place my family and coach would’ve still been proud of me, because it takes a lot of nerve to do a swim meet!