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By Rukhshona Islamova – Sports –

Junior Johanna Schubert started swimming at the age of 6 and has been keeping with it ever since. She swims the 50 and 100 free and the 100 back for varsity. I sat down with Schubert to ask about her swimming career.

When did you start swimming and why? Did you have any previous experience before starting?

I started swimming when I was about 6 years old, mostly because I was a ball of energy and my mom needed to find a way for me to channel all of my craziness. I joined my first club team about 3 years after I began swimming, and have been on on my primary club team, Heartland Aquatics, for about 6 years.

Do you think you’ll keep with it throughout high school? How about after high school?

I will definitely keep swimming throughout high school! I love representing Lincoln High in any way that I can, and I love being on the same team as my high school peers. I am not sure yet whether I will be swimming in college. This will depend on multiple factors. Overall, I will be going to college for academics over sports, so it will just depend on what is the best fit for me.

What do you like about it?

What I like most about swimming is that it is unlike all other sports. While people are generally built well to run, jump, and throw, swimming is unique in that humans are just not fish! Swimming is first of all, hard, and second of all, very technique-oriented. This means that it requires a lot of mental energy in the form of concentration and perseverance. Besides the challenge it poses, I also just love swimming because of my teammates!

How often do you practice and what does it consist of?

I practice at least six days a week, sometimes more if there is morning practice. Practice usually consists of a warm-up, several main sets, some technique-oriented sets, and a cool down. The main sets change day-by-day. Sometimes we do longer yardage, and other times we focus more on sprinting. In addition to this, we also do drylands which consists of weights, running, and other exercises.

What’s one of your best moments and one of your worst moments from swimming?

We aren’t too far into the season yet, but one of the best moments so far this year was the 400 free relay at the Knight Invite. The 400 free relay is the last event at every meet, and definitely the most mentally demanding because everyone is already tired from their other swims. However, we supported each other and were able to put together a great race. We made our goal of going under 4 minutes and thereby made the secondary state qualifying time by over 6 seconds! (We hope to get the automatic qualifying time later in the season.) I don’t think there has been a specific worst moment, but there have definitely been some difficult days juggling two practices, school, other extracurricular, and sleep. But overall, it’s been a positive season so far and I am excited to see what else it will bring!

What are your favorite strokes?

 My best strokes are freestyle and backstroke, but freestyle is my favorite at the moment. My primary events are the 50 and 100 free and the 100 back.

Do you play any other sports? If so, what’s your favorite between all of them?

Besides swimming, I also run track and cross country for Lincoln High (although I did not do cross country this fall so that I could focus on pre-season swimming.) It’s impossible for me to choose between swimming and running, and I definitely enjoy having a balance between multiple sports. I’m a person who needs change-up in my routine sometimes, so it’s definitely nice to go back and forth between sports a little bit. However, I have put a lot more time into swimming, and it is still my primary sport.

Have you learned anything about yourself since you started swimming?