Megan Montgomery AQUA November swimmer of the Month
When many youth today are looking to find an easier way through life, Megan has quickly impressed me with her determination and tenacity towards achieving her goals. Being new to the club this year, in September, I had swimmers all do swims to show me their capabilities and from there I broke the swimmers into the four groups for this year’s program. Megan was on the border between making the Blue Advanced (Top AA group) and the Senior group (AAA). Though having turned 14 years old, I was concerned that she wasn’t yet ready for the demands of the training twice as many practices and hours found in the Senior group and her technique was borderline on some of the swimming.
At the end of that practice Megan came to see me and said she thought she would like to take on the Sr challenges. I told her to think about it and we would monitor the progress. Later that night, she was so determined, she managed to resource her way to getting my personal email and sent me an email about if she didn’t know that she would go Senior, she wouldn’t be able to sleep all night. So I told her, it is her decision to make…and made it she did. I am immensely impressed with Megan’s work and training ethics. Though Megan is not the fastest swimmer on the club, she hasn’t missed a single minute of practice. She maintains a 100% attendance including up to three morning and three evening practices a week. Further, she leads the entire club in meters completed, narrowly edging out our top male swimmer. Megan’s parents regularly tell me that she refuses to miss a second of practice because she is so extremely proud of holding top place on the meter count this season to date and doesn’t want another swimmer to surpass her. But not only is she completing the meters, she is soaking in technical advice and you can see she is extremely focused on perfecting her strokes. Known as a “B” performance swimmer over the past two seasons, I am willing to wager that you will see Miss Montgomery on the side of the pool when the East Coast Champs come around (even though her goals are to hit “A” times… I know she will be shocked when she surpasses them). This is going to be a breakthrough season for Megan and it is squarely because of the time, effort and energy she puts into each and every practice. Notably, she has hit some frustrations along the way in practices, but she pushes through…telling me at the end I am the reason she will need “Anger Management” counselling…luckily she is usually too tired by that point to do anything!!
Megan….I am immensely proud of you, your efforts and the start to the season. You are right…you made the right decision!
Submitted by Coach Stephen Diblee
