Jersey Storm has put forth an excellent showing at the Missouri Grand Prix meet
so far this weekend. On Friday evening, Kelsi Worrell started us off swimming the
100 Free, dropping 2 tenths of a second from her best time going a 1:02.46,
breaking the Jersey Storm 13-14 Girls and Open Girls team records.
Saturday morning we returned bright and early to watch some of the nation's best
swimmers compete in finals. It was an absolutely amazing experience to watch 20
Olympians swim - breaking several records along the way. We watched Kirsty
Coventry break the World Record in the 200 Back, Katie Hoff break the American
Record and US Open Record in the 400 Free, along with several other swimmers
breaking pool and meet records in nearly every race. Some of the other famous
swimmers we were able to see were Gary Hall, Jr., Dara Torres, Mary Descenza,
Kate Zeigler, Kara Lynne Joyce, Peter Vanderkaay, Aaron Peirsol, Neil Walker,
Erik Vente, Ian Crocker, Brendan Hansen, Amanda Beard, Ryan Lochte, and
Micheal Phelps....just to name a few!
The fun was just beginning!!! Saturday night we watched the two best swimmers
in the meet compete - Matt Smith and Kelsi Worrell! Matt Smith swam the 200
free, dropping over 4 seconds from his best time, going 2:01.99, breaking team
records for the 15-18 Boys and Open Men. Kelsi swam a best time in the 200 free
in 2:13.04, dropping 5.6 seconds from her best time and 2 tenths in her 50 free,
going 27.90, again breaking both the 13-14 and Open Women team records in
both events.
It's very exciting that we're still only half way through the meet! Sunday morning
we'll watch another session of finals, Kelsi will swim the 100 back and 100 fly on
Sunday night, and Monday morning we'll end our trip with another session at
finals. We'll keep you posted on the results!
(Check out the pictures and scroll down for the continuation of this adventure!)
Team Picture:
Not to drop any names, but .... we hope you said "Hi" to Gary Hall from the rest of us!
$500. for a swim suit ?!!! -- Guess who got to try them out??
Katie Hoff broke Janet Evan's 1988 400 free record!!
To continue...
On Sunday morning we had another exciting day at finals. Some of the more thrilling moments were Katie Hoff's American record in the 200 free, Dara Torres (at 40 years old) and Gary Hall Jr. swimming the 50 free, and three more great swims from Micheal Phelps, Natalie Coughlin, and Kara Lynne Joyce.
At our last session of prelims on Sunday night we saw Kelsi swim two more events, and Matt time trial two. Kelsi started the night with an awesome performance in the 100 Fly - going a 1:06.66 for a 4 second drop! Then she moved into the 100 back where she finished in 1:11.63, another 3 second drop!!! Just a few heats after Kelsi swam, we were all shocked to watch Natalie Coughlin break a WORLD RECORD in that same event - in prelims!!! That's the second time in two days that we've been able to see the fastest swim in history for an event! It's unbelievably exciting to experience that!!! Matt continued our evening with a time trial in both the 200 IM and the 400 Free. He dropped 2 seconds to go a 2:22.52 in the 200 IM, and less than 4 or 5 minutes later he swam the 400 free, going 4:26.60 - which was right near his best time.
Early Monday morning we traveled back to the pool one more time to watch finals. Personally, this was my favorite day of finals because we got to watch the distance events (not that I'm biased at all ;-)). Katie Hoff started the morning just barely missing the American and US Open records in the 800 free, and then later in the day Erik Vendt had hands down the most exciting mile I've ever seen - breaking the US Open record in the process. It was so exciting to watch people really get up and go crazy to watch a distance events (the events they won't even show on TV for the Olympics!).
I'll stop there as to not ruin the surprise of Matt and Kelsi's stories for you. We did have some pretty amazing experiences with all the people we "bumped" into throughout the weekend!
Overall, Jersey Storm had an absolutely AWESOME time at the Toyota Grand Prix in Missouri this year. I'm very excited to see many more swimmers qualify over the coming years and to continue traveling to this meet!!!
Coach Amy
Here are some links to pictures... there are four different albums. You DO NOT have to be a Facebook member to view the photos. If you click on the first photo it will expand to full size, at which point you can scroll quickly through all photos in that album.
If I get a chance, I'll try to add captions sometime in the next century.
The quality came out VERY poor when I uploaded the videos to Google. I will try to email a better version to you.
