Making Sacrifices to Reach Full Potential Head Coach Mickey Wender believes this spring was the most productive off-season training since he arrived at West Point a decade ago. The athletes’ commitment to meet more lofty goals was evident throughout the six-week period that started after spring break in mid-March and ended in early May. To make his point, Wender cites several examples: • Seven swimmers traveled to Arizona in mid- April on their own dime for an Arena Pro Swim Series meet. Their times were hardly championship caliber, which was expected given the time of the year and the little experience they had recently with long-course competition. Nevertheless, senior Josh Sembrano and sophomores Josephine Marsh, Ty Dang and Andrew Blomquist advanced to the finals in one or more events. (Joe Daniels, who graduated in May, was also a finalist. He is training for the World Championship Team Trials this summer and hopes to join Army’s World Class Athlete Program soon afterward.) • Five swimmers competed in a long-course meet near West Point in early May. Here again, their times didn’t set any records, but as Wender says, “The spring is more about training and development than swimming fast, and every time they compete, they learn something.” • NCAA rules restrict mandatory off-season training to eight hours per week, which the coaches used exclusively for pool work. Weight training was relegated entirely to what the NCAA labels “optional/voluntary.” “Yet over three quarters of the team made a commitment,” Wender says. “That’s important because the spring is the most effective time to get stronger. A bunch of them developed the strength that will transfer to faster swimming and better diving in the fall.” • Many swimmers and divers continued training through the end of May. A handful practiced throughout the spring as if it were January and February instead of April and May. A half dozen were at a optional/ voluntary early morning practice the day before graduation. Page 1 ARMY SWIMMING & DIVING Summer 2017 In this Issue: Competitive Schedule…………2 Practice Routine……..………….3 New Coaches……….…………..4 Awards…………………………...5 Recruits….……………………….6 Alumni….………………………..8 Key Links • All-Time Top-10: Men Women • Donations • Records Head Coach Mickey Wender
Transcript
Making Sacrifices to Reach Full Potential Head Coach Mickey Wender believes this spring was the most productive off-season training since he arrived at West Point a decade ago. The athletes’ commitment to meet more lofty goals was evident throughout the six-week period that started after spring break in mid-March and ended in early May. To make his point, Wender cites several examples:
• Seven swimmers traveled to Arizona in mid-April on their own dime for an Arena Pro Swim Series meet. Their times were hardly championship caliber, which was expected given the time of the year and the little experience they had recently with long-course competition. Nevertheless, senior Josh Sembrano and sophomores Josephine Marsh, Ty Dang and Andrew Blomquist advanced to the finals in one or more events. (Joe Daniels, who graduated in May, was also a finalist. He is training for the World Championship Team Trials this summer and hopes to join Army’s World Class Athlete Program soon afterward.)
• Five swimmers competed in a long-course meet near West Point in early May. Here again, their times didn’t set any records, but as Wender says, “The spring is more about training and development than swimming fast, and every time they compete, they learn something.”
• NCAA rules restrict mandatory off-season training to eight hours per week, which the coaches used exclusively for pool work. Weight training was relegated entirely to what the NCAA labels “optional/voluntary.”
“Yet over three quarters of the team made a commitment,” Wender says. “That’s important because the spring is the most effective time to get stronger. A bunch of them developed the strength that will transfer to faster swimming and better diving in the fall.”
• Many swimmers and divers continued training through the end of May. A handful practiced throughout the spring as if it were January and February instead of April and May. A half dozen were at a optional/voluntary early morning practice the day before graduation.
“More and more of them are choosing to make the sacrifices necessary to reach their full potential,” Wender says. “They believe they can win and they want to make it happen. This is a very motivated group of athletes.”
Wender sees more positives over the summer. Twelve team members will attend summer school at West Point for four weeks and train daily. Another 12, some of them sacrificing leave time, will arrive at West Point on July 31 for three weeks of Physical Individual Athletic Development (PIAD), a euphemism for voluntary, pre-season training.
When the entire team reassembles in late August, Wender looks forward to working with a leadership element that comprises a healthy mix of vocal encouragement and silent example. Evin Rude, Josh Sembrano, Peter Mikheyev, Margaret Ireland, Cecelia Croman and Sidney Evans were names that immediately came Wender’s mind, though he quickly pointed out that the list is hardly all-inclusive.
“I could mention all of the seniors on the women’s team,” Wender says. “And on both teams there are people you don’t hear about much but are doing the work and setting the example that promotes a positive competitiveness within the group. There’s a source of pride about working hard.”
The hope is that all of this will convert to 100 percent career best times or diving scores during the upcoming season. If the athletes improve, the other goals – beating Navy, winning the Patriot League Championships, having a presence at the NCAA’s – will take care of themselves.
“Many swimmers got a lot faster last season and that taught us a lot,” Wender says. “Primarily, we learned that we can compete with anyone
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2016-2017 Proposed Schedule Oct 5 – 8 Florida International Inv. Miami
Oct 13 Massachusetts West Point
Oct 20 Yale New Haven
Nov 3 Columbia (men) New York City
Nov 4 Fordham (women) New York City
Nov 10 Connecticut Waterbury, CT
Nov 16 – 19 Terrier Invite Boston
Dec 7 Navy Annapolis
Jan 13 Bucknell West Point
Jan 19 Penn Philadelphia
Jan 20 George Mason Fairfax, VA
Feb 14 – 17 Patriot League Championships Annapolis
Feb 24 -25 Army Invite West Point
Mar 14 – 17 Women’s NCAA Champs Columbus, OH
Mar 21 – 24 Men’s NCAA Champs Minneapolis, MN
Senior Evin Rude - vocal encouragement, silent example
Making Sacrifices to Reach Full Potential
in the conference. The men took Navy to the last relay in the dual meet and to the last day at Patriots. The men and women combined to win 10 events at the championships. In the process, they broke 20 of the 40 Academy records, a few that had been around a long time. Now only two records go back more than three years.
“The challenge the coaching staff has is to keep getting them faster. Pete Mikheyev came here last year as a 1:51 IM’er. He won the Patriot League with a 1:47. He’s going to have to work harder to keep improving. But like a lot of others, he’s up to it. He sent me an email the other day asking for suggestions about doing three-hour practices during the summer.”
Wender promptly corrects himself, substituting “smarter” for “harder.” He knows that pounding the athletes doesn’t necessarily convert to faster swimming or better diving. Last season, intense training continued after a particularly tough 10 days of workouts over the Christmas holidays. For some swimmers, particularly the backstrokers and breaststrokers, the unrelenting intensity showed itself at the Patriot League Championships.
“We always keep striving to individualize the training and most of the time we get it right,” Wender says. “But we might have made a mistake with the women distance swimmers last season. We tried to do more high quality, race pace work and it backfired. I think they need more yardage and aerobic work.”
One other lesson Wender learned from last season, and several seasons before that, is to assiduously protect practice time. The abundant commitments cadets face daily offer numerous reasons to miss practice.
“They are being pulled in a thousand different directions and my tendency during my first few years was to acquiesce way too often,” Wender says. “Now, we guard practice much more closely. We also work to recruit and retain swimmers who love to swim. They want to be at practice because they want to get better. You can’t coach desire. We give them the opportunity and they want to train. We saw that this spring, and I think we will see the results this season.”
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Making Sacrifices to Reach Full Potential
Practice Routine Below is the anticipated practice schedule for the middle distance group this season. The schedule for the other groups, including divers, roughly mimics the proportion of in-pool training, weight lifting, and dryland exercises. It works out to 20 hours per week – 15 hours in the pool and 5 hours in the weight room or doing dryland exercises.
Saturday - swim 8:00-10:20 am; weights 10:30-11:20 am
The coaching staff will have two new assistants this season. Priscilla Barletta will take Nicki Stanley’s position and Greg Brown will replace Tony Lisa as an assistant coach and recruiting coordinator. (Stanley is leaving to get into athletic administration. Lisa stepped in last fall after an assistant left unexpectedly. He’s returning to retirement life in New Jersey.)
This will be Barletta’s second close encounter with West Point and Head Coach Mickey Wender. As a high school senior in 2008, she was recruited by Wender and came within a hair’s width of accepting an appointment before deciding to go to Lehigh.
“In the back of my mind there was some doubt about whether I made the right decision,” she says. “I loved Lehigh, but I always felt a special connection to Army.”
Ironically, when she decided this spring to leave an assistant’s job at the University of Connecticut after the head coach announced his retirement,
her former coach at Lehigh asked her to join his staff. Once again, it was Army or Lehigh.
“I wasn’t going to turn Army down for Lehigh a second time,” she says. “Army has been improving so much over the years. I want to be a part of that progress.”
Barletta graduated from Lehigh with a degree in biology and a school record in the 200 free. She has a master’s from Montclair (N.J.) State in exercise science. Before Connecticut, she coached club and high school teams in New Jersey.
Brown comes to West Point from Florida Atlantic University. During his two years there he got to know Coach Wender as he absorbed career advice and they discussed training strategies. In the meantime, he became familiar with the Army program.
“Even before the position became available, I felt this is the program I want to be part of,” Brown says. “I want to be part of the rivalry -- beating Navy and winning the Patriot League championships.”
Brown is beginning his 14th year of college coaching. Before Florida Atlantic, he was the head men’s and women’s coach at Marywood University in Scranton, Pa., and before that, the head women’s coach at Siena College in Albany, N.Y. He graduated with a history degree from Lycoming College in 2002, where he was a four-time All-Middle Atlantic Conference selection. His wife is about to have their first child.
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New Coaches
Greg Brown will take on the added duty of
recruiting coordinator. He’s coming from Florida Atlantic
University
New Army assistant coach Priscilla Barletta recently
coached at the University of Connecticut
Most Valuable
Female (Rex Storch Award): Senior Kelly Hamilton – Patriot League champion and league and Academy record holder in the 100 back
Male: Sophomore Tom Ottman – Patriot League Champion in 500 and 1650 free and Academy Record holder in the 500, 1000, and 1650 free
Most Improved
Female: Junior Bridget Ritter – Dropped her best time this season in the 400 IM from 4:21.05 to 4:17.82 to win the Patriot League title and break her own Academy record. Also finaled at the Patriot League Championships in the 500 and 200 free with significant improvements in her best times.
Male (Stephen Childers Award): Sophomore Sean Martin – part of an Academy record setting 800 free relay and Patriot League finalist in the 200 free. Improved his 200 free time this season from 1:40.67 to 1:38.70.
Most Valuable Plebe
Female: Josephine Marsh – Academy record holder in the 200 back
Serica Hallstead – NCAA Zone Qualifier in the one- and three-meter
Male (Dorothy “Skippie” Buncher Award): Peter Mikeyev – Patriot League Rookie of the Year and league champion and Academy record holder in the 200 IM
Most Inspirational
Female: Senior Danielle Nuszkowski
Male: Senior Sean Regan
Leadership and Performance
Female (Joe and Anna B. Stetz Award): Senior Kelly Hamilton
Male (Class of 1923 Award): Senior Devin McCall
Team Captains
Women’s Team (Lt. Gen. John Phillips Daley Award): Seniors Jessica Burkett and Kelly Hamilton
Men’s Team (Capt. Michael W. Kilory): Seniors Sean Regan and Devin McCall
Black Knight Awards (presented annually by the Army Athletic Association to the outstanding athletes from throughout the Corps):
Women’s Firstie of the Year: Kelly Hamilton
Academic Excellence Award: Kelly Hamilton (3.67 GPA, kinesiology major)
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Army Swimming and Diving 2016-17 Awards
Team captain Kelly Hamilton won the women’s team leadership and most valuable swimmer
awards. In addition, the Army Athletic Association honored her for academic excellence
and female firstie athlete of the year.
Men:
James Bilbrey, Murrieta, CA: 400 IM – 3:55.53; 200 fly – 1:48.83;
Heather Yoshi, Mission Viejo, CA: 2015 national AAU champion in one-meter
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Incoming Swimmers and Divers
Heather Yoshi was a national AAU champion in one-meter diving
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Alumni ConnectionCarolyn (Harris) Furdek (’00) was on her third combat tour as an engineer officer when the first episode occurred. One minute she was functioning normally, the next she was as inert as a bag of flour.
“I was quiet, fearful, and no longer effective,” she says. “After two previous deployments without a problem, I couldn’t function.”
She was promptly transferred to a psych ward in Germany where she regained vitality almost as quickly as she lost it and then returned to her unit in Afghanistan. But the mysterious malady resurfaced often enough that she was medically discharged in 2006 at 50 percent disability.
Over the next 10 years she endured nine “locked-in” episodes, as she labeled them, each requiring a hospital stay that varied from two days to three months. As severity of the bouts decreased, the length increased. Unsure of the source of the problem, doctors tried one treatment after another, basically guessing at a solution. Nothing worked.
“Ninety-five percent of the time, I was functioning fully,” Carolyn says, “but every year or two, I shut down and there was no apparent trigger.”
“Functioning” would be an understatement. She earned a PhD in physical therapy. She married Joe Furdek and gave birth to two boys. She pursued running and triathlons with a passion, much as she did swimming at West Point, where she was twice the swimmer of the meet at the Patriot League Championships (her times in distance free events dating back to the late 1990’s remain among Army’s all-time top-10), and completed three marathons and four Ironman triathlons.
A diagnosis finally came about fortuitously two years ago when a VA mental health provider referred Carolyn to a doctor who had studied PTSD. He prescribed an anti-seizure medication and there have been no episodes since.
Soon afterward, Carolyn penned a lengthy letter to her mother relating everything from the first episode through the last. The letter was passed on to friends via the internet and exposure expanded by orders of magnitude. Speaking engagements followed. She lengthened the letter into a book: Locked-In: A Soldier and Civilian’s Struggle with Invisible Wounds, which is available on Amazon. (Search by using the full title.)
“My hope,” she says, “is to change the way we think and behave towards those who struggle with these kind of wounds.”
Carolyn, Joe, and their two boys live in Louisville, Kentucky. She works at the University of Louisville Trauma Center and assists at the local VA hospital.
