It's been a mixed week in Minneapolis thus far. On Wednesday Amanda Croix won the first NCAA Swimming title in Carthage history as the women flirt with the top eight. On the guys side we seem to be coming up just short here and there. The NCAA Championships are a meet where 50% improvement is considered a great achievement and each day Doug and Kyle have flirted with a great swim, but at a meet like this you need the perfect swim to make it back at night.
What I've liked though is how both guys have been approaching the meet - both this week and in the weeks leading up to it. A couple of years ago I think it would be safe to say Kyle was a nervous wreck, but its clear he's much more composed and confident going into his best event tomorrow - the 200 Backstroke. Doug has been much the same. As I told him this morning, I've watched him grow from "hopefully confident" to genuinely confident here in the last year and that confidence has begun paying off and will pay even bigger dividends down the road.
That's about as sentimental as I get - and we're not about sentimentality. We've got some big swims tomorrow, and with the announcement on Tuesday that they will be qualifying sixteen relays next year we've got some big plans for the coming season.