My Passion – Swimming By Yasmeen

I am an athletic person and I like competition and game time. One of the sports that always brings out the competition in me is swimming. I swim at Marist College for the Red Fox Aquatic Club In Poughkeepsie NY. This is my second year swimming there, and I wouldn’t change that experience for the world. Swimming has always brought out the confidence in me. One day my dream is to swim at the Olympics and take home that trophy. One of my biggest inspiration is Michael Phelps.  Swimming helps me focus, if I am in a bad mood swimming has always been there. If I am stressed with school swimming has always been there. Swimming is something that has always been there for me and I never want anyone to take it away from me.

BreaststrokeJD Lasica via Compfight

 

My name is Yasmeen and here is my story about my passion for swimming. It was a Friday afternoon and I was ready to do the 200 freestyle. Each 25 is a lap that means a 200 is 8 laps. I was getting ready to go up. I was racing my two friends and that was it. I dove in I started out in first. I was just about halfway through the first 25 and one of my goggles fell of. I knew if I stopped I wasn’t going to win, I wouldn’t drop time, neither would my coaches be happy. On top of all of that I would get disqualified from my race. I was very happy my coach told me that before my race.

I came to the wall and could see the wall with one goggle. While my other eye had water pounding into it like there was no tomorrow. I could see my friends Gabby and Julia on the sideline telling me to keep going. I could see my coach Paul waving his paper and yelling. I did the first flip turn. By the first 4 laps I was still in first. I kept saying to myself, ‘You can do it Yasmeen, just keep going’. Every time I took a breath I could see the judges and pool officials looking at me. They thought I was going to stop. Well they thought wrong. By the next 6 laps I was head to head with one of my friends. I started sprinting to the other end. I beat my friend to the wall and hit the pad. I heard all my teammates and coaches cheering for me. I took my cap and goggles off and waited for the next swimmer to dive in. I climbed out.

At the wall I saw my friend Gabby. “Yasmeen you did it!” . Then gave me a hug. She gave me my towel and flipflops and took me to my coaches.  “Great job Yasmeen,” Victoria told me.

“ You okay?” was the first thing my coach Paul told me. I nodded my head. He smiled and said “Good work!” I got high fives from everyone. I went to the locker room to change. As I was opening the door, Iheard a lady in the microphone say “Congratulations Yasmeen for completing her 200 freestyle.” Then everyone clapped.

I finished changing and came out of the locker room. My dad smiled, “ Great Job!”

“Awesome job Yasmeen!” my mom added. That day my dad took me goggle shopping and out to eat. I felt awesome and tired. If there is one thing I am going to say to all athletes, it is  when the going gets tough you have to keep going, or else you can’t say you tried it. Swimming will always be my confidence booster. Home is where the pool is and it will always be my home.  Never give up and always work hard. “ When you want to breathe as bad as you want to succeed that is when you know you’ll be successful” ~ Eric Thomas.

 

UWSP Swim 7817

Jay Kleeman via Compfight

2 thoughts on “My Passion – Swimming By Yasmeen

  1. Hi Yasmeen. I think your story is awesome. I am not on a swimming team. So I don’t under stand terms like ‘the 200 freestyle’. I liked the story a lot.
    James TX USA

  2. Dear Yasmeen,
    I love your post,it sounded very interesting and swimming sounds like a very interesting passion.My passion is football.Swimming also calms me down when i’m mad or stressed out.Keep up the good work.

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