Coming off a less-than-stellar performance in the Big Ten championships, Adams is still looking to snag a spot in the 2001 NCAAs. And she’s using a sign her teammates placed on her locker for added motivation.
The sign reads: “There’s no such thing as last chances. Only new beginnings.”
Adams – along with Katie Simmons, Erica Rose, Lauren Moore and Maria Reeves – will get one more shot this weekend at qualifying for the NCAAs when they travel to Ann Arbor, Mich., for the Last Chance Meet.
The invitational provides swimmers with one final opportunity to qualify for the NCAA championships in Long Island, N.Y. The top 25 finishers in each event nationwide receive berths to the NCAAs.
Adams, who is currently seeded 27th in both the 100- and 200-yard butterfly events, said she wants to swim her best time and return to the form that got her to last year’s championships. She placed 11th in the 100 fly last year and received honorable mention All-American honors.
“Hopefully I’ll do better (than at Big Tens), and everything will come together like it should,” Adams said. “I’m just hoping I swim faster. Even if I swim faster and I don’t get in, then at least I did better.”
To improve her time, Adams has been working on her stroke. She has focused on bobbing her hips up and down like a dolphin to maximize the distance of each stroke and gather more strength in the water.
And coming off the taper for Big Tens, coach Jimmy Tierney raised his team’s level of intensity in practice early in the week. The Wildcats have since eased off with the meet now closer at hand.
Simmons, too, has been trying to smooth out the kinks in her technique to better her lackluster time at Big Tens. She will be looking to qualify for the NCAAs in both the 200 breaststroke and the 400 individual medley this weekend. She is currently seeded 33rd in the 200 breaststroke and 39th in the 400 IM.
“I want to go to NCAAs as a freshman because (I will be) at the meet … and I can prepare myself for the next three years and move up,” she said.
Simmons recalled her first time at U.S. nationals, when she was only 14 years old.
“It was a shock because I didn’t know how fast the world of swimming was,” she said.
Now, many starts and turns later, Simmons said she is adjusting to the pressure of big meets, adding that she isn’t nervous for this weekend’s event.
“I’m just going out there to do what I can do,” Simmons said. “Whereas before, all the points were involved and the placing and trying to win the meet, now it’s just me going out for me.”
Adams, who swam in the Last Chance Meet as a freshman, now is trying to motivate the youngsters for the competition. She said it is typically more difficult for swimmers to step up for a meet such as this because it isn’t surrounded by all the hoopla that accompanies major meets. The competition isn’t as stiff, either.
And though this weekend’s meet isn’t a team event, Adams said they still will be racing indirectly for the team – the more who qualify for the NCAAs, the better the Cats will fare at the championships.
Furthermore – holding steadfast to the old adage that there’s strength in numbers – NU’s Tashy Bohm and Vicky West, already on their way to the NCAAs, will only perform better if they have more teammates by their side.
“The more people you get at NCAAs, the better chance you have of winning it,” Adams said. “You can’t win with one swimmer.
“You have to want it – you have to work hard.”
