Teen swimmer qualifies for Olympic trials
She’s pretty laid-back for someone who just qualified for the Olympic trials.
Jaden Bellina, a slender Pearland High School junior, qualified for the 2016 U.S. Olympic swimming trials for age 18 and under in the 200and 400-meter individual medleys last month racing for her club team, Pearland Aquatics.
For Bellina, a two-time Texas University Interscholastic League state champion in the 200-meter individual medley, a race where swimmers use several swimming styles, it’s a story of redemption.
She qualified by crushing her time from last year’s National Club Swimming Association juniors competition, where she missed the cut by a tenth of a second. At this year’s contest in Orlando, Florida, she won so impressively that her coach, John Burke, dropped his stopwatch in favor of his iPhone to record the last 20 seconds of the race.
“I had to go the whole year knowing how close I missed the cut,” said Bellina, 17. “With trials in June, I knew it’d be my last chance to make it” until the 2020 Olympic trials.
A shoulder injury added to the challenge.
“I’ve never wanted something so bad because it was a weight on my shoulders for a year. When I made it, I was in shock; I mean it took me like a year,” she said, as a smile crept across her face. “It feels good because I worked so hard for it and put a lot of time in.”
Many close to her describe the Bellina of a year ago as supremely talented but bogged down by self-applied stress and pressure.
“She said she had to find her love for swimming again,” said Juan Caraveo, her former head coach at Pearland Aquatics who is now a consultant on diversity and inclusion for USA Swimming.
In addition to Caraveo leaving, Bellina lost her four-year training partner to graduation last year. Her mother, Jessica Bellina, said she started doubting herself and her abilities.
Said Caraveo, “You must have goals but you can’t obsess, you have to take it day to day and build off of that and focus on the small details.
“She had the physical gifts but had to pair it with the mental tools. I think we all experience some level of adversity in our lives, but some fold,” he said, “Jaden came out on the other side and really discovered her inner strength.”
Caraveo said Bellina’s injury made her re-evaluate herself as an athlete. He describes her as the worst “kicker” on the team when she first joined at age 12. But after the shoulder injury, she had to develop her kicking and depend on it.
Bellina said she committed herself to honing her “underwaters” (kicking off of the pool wall into a streamline position underwater) and watching film of her breaststroke to adjust her technique.
“Last summer she was OK, not great,” Burke said.
A year later he’s decidedly more convinced.
“I was watching her in Orlando thinking, ‘Oh, that was fast. Wow, she’s got this.’ ”
He said her 400-meter individual medley will be good but is confident her 200-meter individual medley will be even better in Omaha, Nebraska, when the trials start June 26.
Swimmers at the trials must qualify in a preliminary stage in order to compete in semifinals and finals. The top two in each event qualify for the Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
“I’m very competitive,” Bellina said, “Even if I lose it’s like, ‘Am I close to my best time? What did I improve on?’ I’m my own worst enemy.”
Bellina trains for about three hours a day, six days a week, with occasional Sunday practices. During summer, she typically practices twice a day. She said she swims around 7,000 yards per day — roughly 70 football fields.
That dedication also spills over in the classroom where her course load includes a pair of Advanced Placement classes.
Upon qualifying for Olympic trials, Bellina said her social media accounts exploded. Her Twitter feed is littered with congratulations and even a playful suggestion of a documentary.
She said her mother and grandmother — who couldn’t be in Orlando for the competition — greeted her with tears and hugs when she got home. It was then that Bellina said she started to realize the scope of her accomplishment.
“They’re the ones that made me realize what I accomplished,” she said, “I wanted it for so long that when I got it, I thought, ‘What next?’ ”
She’s focused on having a winning attitude.
“It’s intimidating,” adds the 5-foot-6-inch Bellina, “I’m not tall or big for a swimmer. I need to tell myself I earned my spot like they did, I made time just like they did.”
Jessica Bellina is thrilled for her daughter to compete in Omaha.
She recalled a conversation she and her husband, Jerred, had with Jaden when she was 11.
“Jaden told us … she just wanted to be able to sit on her front porch one day and tell her grandkids something awesome that she did in her lifetime,” Jessica Bellina said, “We told her that she can check that off her list because competing at the Olympic Trials will make a great story to tell!”
Still, Bellina writes off the accolade.
“I’m just a teenager who likes to swim,” she said.