No one ever said the training for the summer Olympics in Beijing would be a pleasure cruise. I’ve been working hard in the pool and on land, believe it or not, to improve my swimming.

I was very pleased with my performance at the recent Texas Senior Circuit Championship where I broke the 2-minute mark for the 200-meter butterfly. Maybe you’re wondering what I was doing swimming the butterfly when everyone’s so used to seeing me compete in the backstroke. Well, when I was a kid I swam everything. Yet when a swimmer begins swimming on the international level, he/she usually begins to focus on their best stroke, and mine just happened to be backstroke. Eventually, people forget that you swim anything else but I’ve always trained those other strokes. Nonetheless, my breaststoke is still lacking. It’s tough to be a contender in all the strokes at an international level. But I do practice all the swimming strokes during my workouts – I like to shake things up from time to time.

Speaking of training, though, I’ve been putting a lot of effort in this summer. Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday I have double workouts in the morning and afternoon. On Tuesdays the team works out in the pool just once, but we also do dry land work outs that include weight lifting and stadium runs. And believe me – Myers Stadium sure does have a lot of stairs. After a morning workout on Saturdays the team gets to rest until we start all over again come Monday. But, I can tell you right now it will be worth it.

AP