The Marshfield High School swim team worked hard to prepare for district and state meets. This means that every flip turn, every two-handed wall touch, dives, and strokes must be swam to perfection–or swimmers face disqualification. Most people are unaware of the technicalities of swimming. Like every other sports team, swimming has its own culture. 

“Swimming is more difficult than most people think,” said senior Kally Haynes. “Most people underestimate the distance we swim at practice and at meets.”

Typical practices can be anywhere from one to two miles, depending on the practice. Swimmers are in the water for approximately two hours each day, more during daily doubles, when there is a second practice at 5:30am.

“Swimming is not easy and requires a lot of work,” said swim team member Isabel Hale. 

Through such grueling workouts, swimmers bond–even from other teams. Swimming brings a multitude of people together. For example, the North Bend swim team has been practicing with MHS for a couple of years and the Reedsport swim team has been using the Mingus Park Pool sometimes, also. 

”There is no bad blood between the pirates and bulldogs swimming,” said MHS freshman Jamison Batdorff. 

This is very clear at swim meets when a large portion of the Marshfield will cheer for North Bend as much as Coos Bay and the other way around. North Bend sophomore Emma Slade tied with another swimmer at one of the bigger meets and had to do a swim-off to see who made it to finals. Both the North Bend and Marshfield teams stopped to cheer for her, nearly everyone on both teams. The Marshfield swimming team feels that people cheering makes them swim faster. 

“It’s people’s support that gets me through hard practices,” said Haynes.

Swimming can be more than just a seasonal sport for many. There are several students on the high school team that also swim year-round through USA swimming, or age group swimming. They swim in weekend swim meets throughout the year. These swimmers spend nearly every day at the pool, and hours in the water each week. It becomes a part of life at that point.

“Being told that you can’t [is the hardest part of swimming],” said Trevor Robbins.