Elite swim athletes come back after layoff
For the first hour of Josh Matheny’s return to normalcy, the 17-year-old from Upper St. Clair experienced the sheer exaltation that only water can bring an Olympic hopeful, the heartpounding happiness that accompanies swimming.
Matheny, who won the 200meter breaststroke at the 2019 World Junior Championships, had it better than most. A teammate allowed him to use their small backyard pool in late April, with Matheny attached to a resistance belt for stationary practice. He traveled to Omaha, Neb., to swim for eight days in late May. St. Clair Country Club opened when he got back, allowing Matheny to continue his training.
But during his first few practices back, reality soon set in, a reminder of the month he went entirely away from the pool during the coronavirus pandemic — and the adverse effects of it.
“After probably an hour and a half,” Matheny said, “I was like, ‘Oh boy.’ ”
Around the Pittsburgh area, high-level swimmers — from Olympic hopefuls to those with college aspirations — have rolled with the unpredictability that comes with the pandemic. It created a rare set of
circumstances for coaches and swimmers, resulting in dry land workouts over Zoom and socially distant practices since teams officially returned to the water in June.
Many teams in the Allegheny Mountain Swimming organization — which comprises 47 clubs across Western Pennsylvania and West Virginia — are yearround competitive programs, giving swimmers an opportunity to compete regionally and nationally against other high-level competitors. And for some, that can garner attention from colleges, a chance to continue swimming competitively.
In the short term, even without meets on the horizon, any amount of swimming is better than none at all.
“The kids are back, and they’re starting to pay attention and starting to get into it. They’re just happy,” Al
Rose, head coach of the Jewish Community Center Sailfish in Monroeville, said recently.
Before returning to the pool June 15, Rose e-mailed workout plans to his swimmers and held meetings over Zoom — including one with Leah Smith, a former JCC Sailfish swimmer and twotime Olympic medalist. Smith also trained with the Sailfish for about two weeks before returning to Arizona, where she resides.
Rose wasn’t alone in employing creative tactics to keep swimmers engaged and in shape. Marian Clark, a coach at Pittsburgh Elite Aquatics, said her team has continued virtual dry land sessions despite returning June 5 to the pool, working on stretching and strength training from home. Plus, Pittsburgh Elite Aquatics has Zoom yoga sessions, hosted by a team mom who’s also an instructor.
Finding a place to swim was more trying for Tom Donati, though, the head coach of the Mt. Lebanon Aqua Club. The swim team’s normal pools — Mt. Lebanon Outdoor Swim Center and the indoor pool at Mt. Lebanon High School — weren’t open, so Donati scrambled to secure a place for his 300-some swimmers in small groups at Bower Hill Swim Club, Montour
Heights Country Club and South Hills Country Club.
The Mt. Lebanon Aqua Club runs groups of 23 swimmers each hour for practice, with signup sheets released each week to coordinate times and locations.
“Usually in the summer it’s a little more relaxing. We coach in the morning, we’re outside,” Donati said. “For my board and myself, orchestrating and organizing it, I mean, coaching has been the easy part. Being the man who’s putting kids everywhere and staffing it and changing every day has just been — difficult would be an understatement.”
And when the weather gets cooler and swim teams must transition back inside, there will be another hurdle to climb, one some coaches are already anticipating.
“Hopefully by the time we do have to go back inside for Pittsburgh, we’ll have some more information, and maybe real data on how to continue to stay healthy,” Clark said.
In the future, swim teams in the area might hold virtual swim meets, submitting times from swimmers at different locations to see how they stack up against competitors. That might work locally, but complications remain for swimmers looking to advance to the next level.
“They can’t go visit schools in the fall. They don’t even have their next big meet to show them, ‘Hey, this is where I’m at,’ ” Donati said.
For Matheny, though, having no meets in the immediate future offers some benefits. He has committed to Indiana, so he doesn’t need to worry about college offers.
And while Matheny had been upset for about two weeks after the Olympic trials had been postponed, he now sees the positives. He’ll be another year older, another year stronger, when the 2021 Olympic trials come around.
“I think there could be some advantages if we play it right,” said Dave Schraven, Matheny’s coach at Pittsburgh Elite Aquatics and Upper St. Clair. “We’re choosing to look at this as an opportunity as opposed to some obstacle that needs to be overcome.”