The Stanford men’s swimming and diving team has been whizzing past competitors, earning the title as one of the top swim and dive teams in the nation.
The Cardinal has the No. 1 ranked recruiting class, including a total of 16 All-American swimmers. Stanford looks to ratchet up its training in the coming weeks in order to prepare for the more competitive spring season.
“The first part of the season is being more focused on the spring. It’s not about how fast you can swim in the fall but how fast you can swim in the spring,” said junior swimmer David Mosko. “We don’t have to do a whole lot of qualifying in the beginning of the year.”
Many of the major competitions occur in the spring, including the NCAA championship and Pac-10 championship. But while its focus lies forward, the Cardinal already has built up an extremely impressive record so far this year.
“We are right there,” said Coach Skip Kenney. “We are going to battle for the Pac-10 championship and the NCAA championship. We don’t know what kind of teams we’ll be facing.”
In the Stanford swim team’s first meet in September against the University of New Orleans, the Cardinal men swept UNO and took first place in almost every event.
In the beginning of October, the Cardinal hosted its first meet of the 09-10 season against the University of Hawaii. The men’s swim team was stacked with a total of sixteen All-American swimmers and senior Dwight Dumais was victorious at both diving events. At the Pacific Invitational in Stockton in mid-October, Stanford won eight out of the ten events against Air Force, Brigham Young University, Cal and Pacific.
In early November, senior Carmen Stellar took first in the three-meter against Florida and Michigan at the tri-meet in Gainesville, Florida.
The Cardinal dominated the rest of November as Stanford swimmers swept through the Tri-Distance Meet, hosted by Cal. Senior Eugene Godsoe won the 50-meter back (22.58), 100-meter back (48.26) and 200-meter back (1:47.00), giving him a win in each of the backstroke events. La Tourette also had a successful meet as he won the 500-meter freestyle (4:29.48) and 1000-meter freestyle (9:09.14).
In addition, La Tourette recently returned from the Dual in the Pool, a competition where athletes from Britain, Italy and Germany come together and form a team to compete against the USA, hosted in Manchester, England in mid December.
“I was really pleased with my performance. It was actually the last time we wore body suits in a competition,” La Tourette said.
While the team’s performances so far may inspire confidence, the Cardinal swimmers may be facing some unfamiliar faces when they dive back into the pool this spring. Many schools, including Cal, Auburn and USC, bring in freshmen after the fall competitions, leaving many schools like Stanford in suspense about potential spring surprises.
“You can go to some school for [just a few] weeks then go to NCAAs, ” Kenney said about the practice of racing freshmen in their first year. “That doesn’t happen here. You have to be a student athlete, which is the way it should be.”
The Cardinal still holds a few goals in mind to achieve before competition starts.
“We have to work on speed,” Kenney said. “As our speed gets better, our turns should get better.”
Many of the Stanford swimmers have already earned outstanding achievements this past year and they look toward the spring season as an opportunity to boost their records.
La Tourette has won two All-Americans in the 500-meter and 1500-meter freestyle in 2009 and was also the Pac-10 Champion in the 1650-meter freestyle in 2009. In December, La Tourette set an All-American in the 800-meter freestyle while at the Dual in the Pool in England. Mosko holds six All-Americans in the 200-meter butterfly in 2009, 800-meter freestyle relay in 2008, 500-meter freestyle in 2008 and 2009, the 1500-meter freestyle in 2009 and the 1650-meter freestyle in 2008.
This season should be one of success, starting with a meet against Pacific this Saturday, January 9 at 1:00 p.m. at the Avery Aquatic Center.