Parry O'Brien 1932-2007 Track & Field Olympian; Masters Swimmer
Former Member
It is with great sadness that I let you know that Parry O'Brien, a member of Southwest Masters of the Southern Pacific LMSC passed away yesterday at the SPMA Short Course Regional Championships in Santa Clarita. He suffered a heart attack about half way through his 500 yd freestyle. His wife, Terry, was counting for him.
Parry O'Brien is best know to the world as a champion shot putter. His innovative technique is in use today, and gave him gold medals in the 1952 and 1956 Olympics and a silver in 1960. He placed 4th in 1964.
Parry is best known to me as the guy competing in the 200 fly a lane or two over from me. He has been a member of United States Masters Swimming since 1987.
Besides a great athlete, Parry was a friendly, wonderful guy. He knew of my husband's interest in his track and field career, and included several signed cards when he sent his 2007 registration to me.
We will miss you, Parry, and we extend our sincerest sympathy to your family and friends.
Julie Heather
As others have said, our thoughts and prayers are with Parry's friends and family.
Parry's copious preparation sounds like an amplified version of things that I have tried and found success with. In college I would take one sheet of paper and write down my goals for an upcoming meet. I would start off with normal sentences, then add bullet points of important strategies for each event, and then at the bottom of the page I would add sort of a statistical appendix of how I planned to split each race. Now I type up a race report prior to important competitions. (Still need to do this for Nationals...) The report is in the same format as what I will blog after the event. The idea is to have to change as little text as possible after the actual races.
I should mention that while standing behind the blocks before a race, I think about no more than four things. So right before a 400 IM, I have only one key thought for each stroke. That helps to calm me down and focus on the most important things I need to do. I can't imagine thinking about 75 things at once. I think Mike Barrowman was quoted as saying that he had to be thinking about over 100 things at a time to properly execute his wave stroke. I didn't believe him at the time, but now I'm wondering if he was telling the truth. The difference between Olympic champions and the rest of us, indeed.
As others have said, our thoughts and prayers are with Parry's friends and family.
Parry's copious preparation sounds like an amplified version of things that I have tried and found success with. In college I would take one sheet of paper and write down my goals for an upcoming meet. I would start off with normal sentences, then add bullet points of important strategies for each event, and then at the bottom of the page I would add sort of a statistical appendix of how I planned to split each race. Now I type up a race report prior to important competitions. (Still need to do this for Nationals...) The report is in the same format as what I will blog after the event. The idea is to have to change as little text as possible after the actual races.
I should mention that while standing behind the blocks before a race, I think about no more than four things. So right before a 400 IM, I have only one key thought for each stroke. That helps to calm me down and focus on the most important things I need to do. I can't imagine thinking about 75 things at once. I think Mike Barrowman was quoted as saying that he had to be thinking about over 100 things at a time to properly execute his wave stroke. I didn't believe him at the time, but now I'm wondering if he was telling the truth. The difference between Olympic champions and the rest of us, indeed.
