It's been cool for me over the last few years seeing and competing against a number of guys from both my age group and collegiate days. However, when I think back to my college team, in particular, I'm struck by how many guys are NOT back swimming and competing in Masters. I realize this is probably the wrong audience to ask (since we're back in the pool), but, since for me swimming & competing go hand in hand and I love swimming, I'm still puzzled why more people don't come back to the sport and to racing?
I think very famous swimmers like Mary T or Tracy Caulkins face an added barrier: if they entered a meet, they would swim under (real or imagined) fairly large expectations, even in a masters meet. Who would want that? Maybe better to participate in a sport where they are relatively unknown.
In addition to what Wookie mentioned about my coach, he also doesn't compete due to what he calls the "large target on his back". We saw it towards former Olympic athletes at Atlanta's Nationals. My coach would get the same thing and what would people (or he) think if he didn't match his old times? Without being able to train like he used to (in addition to 14 more years), he would probably not be close to his former Olympic times now and doesn't want that target. But I'm working on him. His sister just got back in to competition. Now to work on him.
Yes, Wookie, go Vols :)
I think very famous swimmers like Mary T or Tracy Caulkins face an added barrier: if they entered a meet, they would swim under (real or imagined) fairly large expectations, even in a masters meet. Who would want that? Maybe better to participate in a sport where they are relatively unknown.
In addition to what Wookie mentioned about my coach, he also doesn't compete due to what he calls the "large target on his back". We saw it towards former Olympic athletes at Atlanta's Nationals. My coach would get the same thing and what would people (or he) think if he didn't match his old times? Without being able to train like he used to (in addition to 14 more years), he would probably not be close to his former Olympic times now and doesn't want that target. But I'm working on him. His sister just got back in to competition. Now to work on him.
Yes, Wookie, go Vols :)
