Each month, The Final Sprint will detail recent events that have happened in the world of swimming. Whether it be a fast time, an organizational announcement or a social media post you need to see, The Final Sprint has you covered. Here are a few things that took place this past month:

Between Lane Lines
As the NCAA season heads towards conference and eventual NCAA Championships, a slew of U.S. National Team and National Junior Team members posted standout performances in January. University of Virginia freshman Gretchen Walsh blasted a 23.04 in the Virginia-NC State Dual Meet 50-yard backstroke to give her the second-fastest swim in the history of the event. Walsh, along with National Team teammates Kate Douglass, Ella Nelson, Alex Walsh and Emma Weyant, will lead the top-ranked Virginia program into the ACC Championships, which take place February 15-19. 

In men’s swimming, Carson Foster and Drew Kibler led a quartet of Texas Longhorns to a pool-record time of 7:14.37 in a 4x200-meter freestyle relay during a long course time trial at a dual meet with TCU. While pool records come and go, this particular record stands out when looking at the history of Texas 200m freestyle specialists who have tested the Lee & Joe Jamail Texas Swimming Center pool — Townley Haas, Jack Conger, Ricky Berens, Josh Davis and the list goes on. 

Most NCAA conference championships take place in mid-February and will set the stage for the NCAA Division I Swimming & Diving Championships, which take place March 16-19 (women) and March 23-26 (men). In USA Swimming national events news, time standards were released for the 2022 Open Water National & Junior Championships.  

Around the Pool Deck
A few organizational programming announcements were released last month, including three updates that were made to Swim-a-Thons for 2022. The 5% required contribution to the USA Swimming Foundation will be reinstated, Swim-a-Thon resources will be made digital and the USA Swimming Foundations will be providing new prizes for Swim-a-Thon participants. More details can be found here. 

Registration also opened for the 2022 USA Swimming Workshop, which takes place April 21-24 in Denver, Colorado. This workshop will cover a variety of topics that will be helpful to coaches, Local Swimming Committee members, non-athlete and athlete members. Members can register here, and additional information on the USA Swimming Workshop can be found at https://www.usaswimming.org/coaches/clinics-workshops#usa-swimming-workshop. 

The Content You Need
Olympic bronze medalist Annie Lazor took time to speak to elementary school children through Harper for Kids. She spoke on being positive, lessons she has learned and how to learn and grow from hardships. Watch the quick video here!

Lazor’s Olympic teammate Abbey Weitzeil joined USA Swimming’s Kick Set podcast to touch on a number of things including a behind-the-scenes look of what being on an Olympic relay is like and a great story on how her Olympic gold medalist title does not stop her from the fear of an I.M. training set. Listen along on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. 

Also, Michael Andrew got a pet snake?!

Tips and Tricks
Many swimmers put their focus on how they feel in warm-ups or going into a meet. However, when the focus is placed on the feel of what the athlete is doing in the moment is what will truly define the race. Read more from Dr. Alan Goldberg here.