The Panthers are in sunny Fort Lauderdale, training at Pinecrest Academy, both short and long course.They will be on the trip through the 15th of January before resuming the regular season schedule second semester against Carthage College on Jan. 14.
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The sixth entry comes from freshman Sierra Townsend:To begin our eighth day in Florida, the team traveled to the pool with nothing but a vague idea as to what our practice would contain. After a long team warm up, coach Kyle Clements instructed us to split up into groups. To the upperclassmen on the team, this meant one thing: stations. As a freshman, I had been told many horror stories of training trip: the pain train, goal 50's, tough dryland practices, animal kicks, a biathlon, and much more. However, stations was the one practice that was rumored to be somewhat enjoyable.
Stations consist of – you guessed it! – different stations. Each lane contained either a set or a drill that focused on one specific aspect of swimming. For example; one lane dealt with breath control, another with our underwater kicking, and a third with IM. The practice was a nice differentiation from the standard practice format we were used to. It was also nice to swim with teammates outside of our usual practice group; my group enjoyed a hauntingly beautiful rendition of Adele’s Rolling in the Deep as performed by Maggi Beck, Brady Huemann, and Evan Green.
After practice, a large majority of the team headed down to the beach to improve our tans (or, for some of us, our sunburns). We caught a glimpse of a few manatees and an odd-looking fish. We also showed off our famous Panther dance moves to make a music video under the direction of the birthday girl, Sophia Schmidt. Some of the team then retired indoors to take a nap and recuperate for the evening practice.
This practice consisted of the classic animal kick set. Animal kicks (I realize this is a peculiar name for a set and I am afraid I do not know of its origin) are simply ten 100's on 1:40 kicking as fast as possible. The women’s team tackled this set in the first hour of practice while the men’s team lifted weights. Throughout the set, the team was encouraging each other to persevere, despite our collective fatigue. This positivity makes it much easier to forget about the soreness and pain of the set and focus instead on putting forth all you have.
For the second hour of practice, the women’s team lifted while the men took to the pool. Our lifting was divided into three stations in which there were four or more individual lifts. The practice ended with everyone doing sit ups and passing a medicine ball down the line we were formed in – a tough exercise developed by captain Heidi Niespodzany.
To end the day, the women’s team was surprised with pizza provided from the Panther favorite, DaVince’s Pizzeria. As a way of releasing some stress from the past week, we also stood in a circle on the beach and all shared one or more positive aspects of our training trip thus far. It was a great way to refocus as a team before the final stretch of our time here in Ft. Lauderdale.
