From May 18th-June 8th many of the top open water athletes in the world will be training at altitude in Colorado Springs, part of a busy few months for the United States Olympic Training Center that will also be playing host to many of the country’s top pool swimmers.
The open water camp will be anchored by swimmers from Tennessee Aquatics, with groups Trojan Swim Club, Australia and Canada joining in.
Besides work at the Olympic Training Center, the swimmers will also do some open water swims at a lake outside of Denver. The location is an unusual one as the US Swimming holds many of their open water training camps at places such as Fort Myers, Florida and other locations that are not at the altitude of Colorado Springs (6035 feet).
University of Tennessee associate coach Tyler Fenwick is excited about the opportunity to work with such a high level group of athletes, “I love open water swimming,” said Fenwick.
“I’m constantly trying to find ways to promote the sport and get swimmers excited about open water. The opportunity presented itself to bring some of the top distance swimmers in the world together and I jumped at it. It should be a fantastic camp! Some of the sports best ambassadors will be in Colorado.”
“(USA Swimming Open Water Program Manager) Bryce Elser recommended (the lake swims). It’s going to be cold, but so will the lake at Pan Ams and in Russia (at the World Championships).”
Fenwick is one of the country’s top open water coaches, working alongside Tennessee head coach Matt Kredich to have trained the top two finishers (Alex Meyer and David Heron) in the men’s 5k at last week’s Open Water National Championships.
The open water specialists will include Olympic gold medalist Ous Mellouli, Olympic silver medalist Haley Anderson, Olympic bronze medalist Richard Weinberger, US National Team members David Heron, Alex Meyer and Jordan Wilimovsky as well as Australian Olympian Jarrod Poort.
Other distance specialists will include Kate Ziegler, Mads Glaesner, Maddy Tegner, Morgan Dickson and Evan Pinion, though not necessarily for open water.
Megan Romano, will join the camp in part at the tail end of a bigger camp with her Longhorn Aquatics teammates from Texas, as will Tennessee breaststroke specialists Molly Hannis and Brad Craig will also be at the camp. Also in attendance will be open water specialist Eva Fabian with her father and coach Jack Fabian, with the two groups coordinating for some joint workouts.
A full breakdown
Tennessee Aquatics
Molly Hannis-US National Team, World University Games
Brad Craig-SC US World Championship Team (American Record in Medley Relay at Worlds), National Champion 200BR
Maddy Tegner-4th at SEC’s in the 1650, had to pull out of NCAA’s with the flu but had 14th fastest time in the country this year
Morgan Dickson-17th at NCAA’s in 1650
Evan Pinion-Former Junior World Champion, NCAA finalist in 1650
David Heron-NCAA All American, US Pan Ams and Worlds Team this summer
Alex Meyer-US Olympian, US World Championship Team this summer
Kate Ziegler-US Olympian
Tennessee Aquatics foreigners
Richard Weinberger (Canada)-Olympic Bronze Medalist. Trained with Tennessee Aquatics for most of April, will be in Colorado Springs for 3 weeks of camp
Jarrod Poort (Australia)-Australian Olympian. Will train with TNAQ from May 4th to June 15th including altitude camp
Team Santa Monica
Jordan Wilimovsky-Will join us for part of the camp as he is still in school at Northwestern
Trojan Swim Club (at altitude before we arrive and then will blend in with the camp)
Ous Mellouli-Open Water Olympic Gold Medalist (Tunisia)
Mads Glaesner-2012 World Champion (1500 free – SCM) (Denmark)
Haley Anderson-Open Water Olympic Silver Medalist
Longhorn Aquatics (at altitude before we arrive and then will blend in with the camp)
Megan Romano – Four-time Relay World Champion, 2012 100 free World’s silver medalist (SCM)
Eva and Jack Fabian will also be there for part of the camp. We plan to coordinate.
This is the first news I’ve heard about Kate Ziegler since she missed the Olynpic 1500 final in London! I wonder if she’s trying to make a comeback, has been training all along, or is trying to transition to open water swimming?