Loyal readers, this is the season you have all been waiting for. The sun will come out. The tennis courts will be back in action. The golf course will open. Intramural softball will be played and taken way too seriously by a select few (ourselves included).
More importantly, loyal readers, this is our last term in our post as the Rec League Legends. To all those major newspaper syndicates out there, we will be free agents and looking to cash in on our talents Lebron-style.
Everyone knows that senior spring is not about moderation or holding back. It’s about doing exactly what you want. This week, I wanted to swim. Again. Mainly because I was not 100 percent sure I passed my swim test despite the many blitzes I received from what must have been every member of the administration regarding the closing of the pool.
So I got in contact with incoming swim team captain Konrad Von Moltke ’15 and set up what experts were calling a Mark Spitz versus Michael Phelps showdown.
Time: Saturday, post-lacrosse game, pre-rugby match. Place: the pool whose name I do not know, but see all the time on the walk to the squash courts.
As all of you have probably come to realize, preparation is the most important aspect of our roles as the Rec League Legends. To that end, we spent all of Monday organizing our schedules around being able to make it to Alumni Gym at exactly 5 p.m., when we thought we would be the only ones there. We tried to convince the guys at the Hop that we planned to come a lot and, after the end of our workouts at 5:30 p.m., they should just assume to prepare a double workout special.
We forgot to set our alarms, took naps and missed the lift, but still ate the meal because that’s what real athletes do. Repeat until Thursday. Friday was an off day, obviously.
Saturday finally rolls around and then we realize that Freddie is out of town, heading South for the weekend in search of greener pastures. I am going at it alone.
I met up with Von Moltke post-lacrosse and we exchanged the usual pleasantries, discussing what we did with our Friday nights, classes, how to stay warm when you took your jacket home with you already and more. We only wasted about an hour watching hockey and basketball recaps before we rallied over to the pool.
We got over there, Speedo-ed up, and Von Moltke showed me the proper way to put on a swim cap, which is obviously essential for the speeds I had planned to go. I did not tell Von Moltke this, but I actually had a bit of experience swimming competitively. I spent most of my athletic prime (ages 8 to 13) on a team. I knew what I was doing.
The first challenge was a 25-meter freestyle (one pool length for you n00bs who missed the last summer Olympics that America won, duh). I called “go” and got a bit of a jump to start things out. I thought I was absolutely smoking him, so much so that I couldn’t even see him. Then Von Moltke popped up about four yards ahead of me, dashed the rest of the way and cruised to a contested five-second victory. Whatever. Still had time to recover.
The second challenge was of a different stroke. Von Moltke had to swim breaststroke, while I could continue to freestyle it all the way down. When executed properly, freestyle should be significantly faster.
But due to bad technique on my part, illegal technique on his or too much chlorine in the pool, he won again. We won’t discuss the margin — those things are not important. I’m over it.
Afterward, I wanted nothing to do with further physical activity because I was exhausted after the 10 to 12 laps we posted. Then Von Moltke informed me that the team swims at speeds possibly a bit faster than mine for much longer, then lifts.
Down one early, nothing we haven’t rebounded from.
We also want to call to all of your attentions an op-ed that was written early last week (“Geller: Support Our Sports,” March 25, 2014) about attendance of athletic events. We could not agree more. Throughout this experience, Freddie and I have gotten the chance to compete against a lot of great student-athletes, men and women who compete for the name on the front of the jersey, not the one on the back. This spring, we are going to try harder to attend more men and women’s sporting events. We hope all of you will, too.
