El Campo swimmers perform in Houston
By KRIS BAGLEY sports@leader-news.com

RICHARD NAVA

El Campo sent four girls to compete against some top teams this weekend in a Texas Interscholastic Swimming Coaches Association meet at the University of Houston.

Hailey O'Briant, Blythe Nava, Randi McClure and Meredith Bard continued a season-long push for excellence in several relays and also a few individual events.

This was the first time El Campo participated in the event. Head Coach Richard Nava said the tough competition should give his team important experience for meets later in the season.

"You swim these dual meets, you swim these other meets and if you beat somebody by 20 seconds, what does that prove?" Nava said. "If you swim your best and do well with some other 5A schools that have programs of 100 kids … that's who you want to swim against. You want to swim against the truly competitive swimmers. It makes you better."

Nava credited tough competition to the girls' performance earlier in the year in a meet at Corpus Christi. Faced against tough competition, the girls excelled in the 200-yard freestyle relay.

"I don't think we could have gotten 1:47.19 in Corpus if we weren't swimming against that caliber of swimmers," Nava said. "Anybody excels if you put up your backs against the wall."

Nava said he believes stiff competition leads to better mental preparedness, which can lead to great a physical performance.

"I always say that your conscious mind won't work," he said. "It's kind of like being in a zone, that you just do it. If you swim your best, you don't even know that you've swam your best because you just unconsciously went into autopilot and just did it.

"You can't say consciously, 'I'm going to swim fast today.' It doesn't work. You have to have like Meredith had it in the Corpus meet. She said her whole body just flushed and she felt her whole body turn on fire. When Blythe came in and touched, she took off."

The relay team came close to their best time this weekend, but still finished below the Corpus Christi record. The girls combined for a 1:48.64. Nava has a goal set to drop a few seconds by the end of the season.

"In Corpus, we were on such a high, a 'cloud nine' if you will," Nava said. "We haven't been able to do that again. It's hard to tap into that repeatedly, over and over again. Hopefully with district coming up and we have a big meet (against) Brazoswood Jan. 12, hopefully we can get back. Our goal is for a 1:45. If we get to 1:45, we'll be in the medal round at state."

If El Campo is to advance to state, the team will likely need improvement on an injury to one of the girls. McClure has missed the past few meets with a hurt wrist. She swam this weekend, but it will still be a while until she is completely healed.

"She's in tremendous pain, but she's a trouper," Nava said. "She doesn't complain. I can see her grimacing and holding her hand, but she's only practiced in the last three weeks, maybe three days. Three days in the pool, you can't be on your best."

Nava said one reason for El Campo's success is Bard's transition to primarily a sprint style of swimming.

"She was utilized as a long-distance swimmer last year and the year before that," Nava said. "I had a heart-toheart with her mom and a heart- to-heart with her and I said, 'I'm going to make her into a sprinter.' She's always been a sprinter, but she's been put into that 500 freestyle. She's great at the 500 freestyle, but I think she can be a great sprinter also.

"Sprinter workouts and your sprinter timing is different. Your long distance is more aerobic and your short distance is more anaerobic, which is, you want to use more energy and not as much oxygen. In the longer one, you want to use more oxygen and spread it out a little more. I think her turning into a sprinter, she's coming close to her fastest times."

More than an individual, it is the team spirit that is helping the girls succeed this year.

"They don't want to let down their teammates," Nava said. "When they come out of the water and one of them has a bad performance, nobody complains. I don't even complain. Everybody knows when you swim bad or have a bad turn.

"You just go forward because our goal isn't this meet or that meet, it's district, regionals and state. We want to be in the medal round at state in February."

The following is a listing of the girls' perfor- mances at the University of Houston this past weekend against several of the Houston area's largest teams.

200-Yard Medley Relay

29. El Campo (Bard, O'Briant, Nava, McClure), 2:11.23

50-Yard Freestyle

36. Nava, 26.68; 46. Bard, 27.20

200-Yard Free. Relay

21. El Campo (Bard, McClure, O'Briant, Nava), 1:48.64

400-Yard Free. Relay

26. El Campo (Bard, McClure, O'Briant, Nava), 4:006.88