SWIMMING: Julian Drew
JUST after 10 o’clock on Wednesday morning in Durban the rain was sheeting down outside the King’s Park swimming pool. It had been raining hard all morning and the start of the day’s proceedings at the South African national aquatics championships was delayed by half an hour to allow competitors and officials time to arrive.
But apart from team contingents and officials there was nobody else present at the pool. There were no spectators. Swimming is not a sport that attracts the paying publ#ic although it was assumed that perhaps a few people might have been tempted to venture poolside in light of the predictions that had been aired in the media over the previous week.
American-based swimmer Penny Heyns,
who was ranked number one in the world last year for the 100m breaststroke, had made it known that she was going to go for the world record at the national championships in her home town. But the folk of Durban seemed singularly unimpressed by the thought of the first swimming world record in a South African pool since Karen Muir eclipsed the 100m backstroke mark at the South African championships in Kimberley back in January 1968.
When Heyns went to the starting blocks in the fifth heat of the 100m breaststroke qualifiers the hall fell s#ilent . As the hooter went and the swimmers plunged into the shimmering, mirror- flat water the rest of of the competitors were immediately consigned to the role of observers as the lonely furrow that ploughed into the waiting blue calmness in front of lane number four became more and more distant.
There were growing murmurs from the small band of priviliged onlookers as she reached the turn in 32,19 seconds. She was 33 hundredths of a second outside the pace of Australian world record holder Samantha Riley’s time at the half-way stage which was just one hundredth quicker than Heyns’ own split for her previous personal best. A mighty effort would be needed in the return leg but Heyns was relentless as she headed
for the finish with the noise rising
by the decibel every metre she swam.
Shrill s#creams ricocheted around the arena as Heyns lunged at the wall but she didn’t look up at the giant scoreboard flashing her time above the pool. She looked instead across at her parents in the stand and knew immediately that the record was hers. She had taken 0.23 seconds off Riley’s world record to set new figures of 1:07.46. If anybody doubted her credentials before there was no longer any question that she would be South Africa’s best hope of gold at the Olympics in Atlanta.
In the evening there were more people present but the stands were still far from full. This despite a photograph of Heyns’ record on the front page of the local evening paper and a quote from the lady herself that she hoped to do better in the final. At the far end of the pool there was a group of bare-torsoed young men with her name splashed in dayglo across their chests and banners from Tot#i High wishing their ex-pupil well.
The mood in the arena was full of pomp and ceremony as the officials marched to the start to the accompaniment of Land of Hope and Glory. They don’t call it the last outpost for nothing. This time Heyns had her University of Nebraska team mate Julia Russell to push her but although the crowd roared encouragement from her very first stroke she couldn’t match her superhuman efforts of the morning.
She fell well shy of trimming the record for the second time in a day. As she climbed out of the water she kept a brave face but didn’t try and hide her dissatisfaction. “I think I’m more disappointed with the way I swam rather than with the time. Going out I knew I was doing something wrong and even though this morning was a world record I wasn’t happy when I watched a video of the race afterwards.
“It wasn’t the way I would have liked to have swum. It wasn’t the stroke I’m looking for,” claimed Heyns. “I wasn’t on top of the water like I was in Japan (the World Student Games last year when she set her previous personal best) and although I can’t really put my finger on it yet I think that maybe I need a bit of a longer taper.”
The taper she refers to is a crucial part of her preparation for a big meeting and getting it exactly right could mean the difference between gold and silver in Atlanta. Tapering is the reduction in training before a big meet to give the body enough time to recover from the heavy loads required to get in top condition.
Heyns and her coach, former Czech Jan Bidrman who defected and competed for Sweden before heading for Nebraska, made no secret of the fact that these championships were all part of their experiment to find out what is best for her before the Olympics. She will get a better idea of how this taper suits her when she competes at the NCAA championships (the American universit#Oy championships) in two weeks’ time.
“I think we are learning all the time,” said Bidrman. “Last year the goal was to peak for the Pan Pacifics but she actually swam faster at the World Student Games about two weeks later. This year we increased the taper by about 10 days so that its now about four-and-a-half weeks but we will have a look at what has happened once she has done the NCAA’s. Only then will we decide what to do for the Olympics,” said Bidrman.
Heyns will take a rest after the NCAA’s before starting her build-up for Atlanta. “Physically she can handle going straight back into training but mentally she must be ready to train hard again. I think the mental break is more important than the physical part of it,” said Bidrman.
They are still toying with the idea of going somewhere warmer to train for the Olympics because in Lincoln where she studies in Nebraska, they only open #the 50m pool in June. At the moment she is training and racing in an indoor 25 yard pool but she will need to get to an Olympic-sized pool soon to get used to the different stroke rate.
The past two weeks have been, one senses, a bit of a strain for Heyns. She has been at the centre of the media’s attention ever since she arrived. Few of those interviewing her understand the finer details of her sport and she will probably be looking forward to escaping back to the relative seclusion of Nebraska where she is not a sports mad nation’s best hope of Olympic glory.
She is non-committal about her prospects in Atlanta even though the rest of South Africa expects nothing less than gold. “I just want to do my best at the Olympic Games. I don’t want it to be too overwhelming otherwise I might make mistakes. If I just swim my own race and try to improve my time then hopefully all will go well, but I don’t want to make any predictions.”