Jan. 7, 2009

January 6 - Ben Wachtel

Recently, I reassessed my goals.

I’m not talking about my goals in the pool, however.  The goals I set in my pre-season meeting still stand, goals which I plan to achieve by the end of the season.  And I still feel like we can not only achieve, but even exceed our team goals.

This trip has reinforced my faith in this team in many ways.  I know that parts of this trip would make excellent scenes for a training montage, and that soon we’ll have a team-unifying moment like in every great sports movie.  Our championship meets are closer every day, and I know this team is going to do something amazing.  I would bet on it, but at the beginning of the year we learned that the NCAA is trying to tackle the issue of gambling, so I’ll just promise.

Sorry to get off topic.  The goals I have reassessed have nothing to do with swimming.  They have everything to do with becoming a professional Mario Tennis player.  For those of you that don’t know, Mario Tennis is a video game for the Nintendo 64.  I am very passionate about Mario Tennis.  I am a very competitive person, so I sort of go into a steely-eyed trance while playing.  

It’s part of the daily routine for my Florida household, which includes myself, Albert Miller, Bill Arzner and Michael Hedge.  Each day we play some old-school video games before our morning workout, then return to the hotel for naptime and shenanigans.  These shenanigans usually involve me wrestling one or more of my roommates, which results in a Ben Wachtel victory via a move I call the Squeezebox.  Michael has probably endured this the most, but that’s because he always must be taught a lesson.  That is one reason why you should never mess with the Purdue Boilermakers.

I believe that another member of the team already wrote about the enormous beast that invaded the pool during our workout time, but I feel further explanation of the incident would help to enlighten the millions of Purdue Swimming and Diving fans that flock to the team website to read our travel logs each day. 

Some would try and tell you this creature was an iguana, but I disagree.  First of all, iguanas do not stand ten stories high and breathe fire.  This creature was none other than a Stegosaurus, a monster that is thought by many to be extinct.  They are incorrect.  This beast leapt almost fifty feet to scale the barrier between the swimming center and the outside world.  It then stared each of us down from the corner of the pool area.  Many bystanders cowered in fear or even ran, screaming in terror.  That’s when I devised a daring plan.  The villain was ready to eat Matt Stewart, but just as it moved toward him, I challenged him to a 200-meter freestyle time trial.  Sorry to gamble again, but I told it that if I lost, he could eat the entire team.  If I won, he had to vacate the premises.

Needless to say, he was too scared to race me.  He wouldn’t even race Greg Franzen, because even Purdue’s managers are impeccable athletes and capable of swimming valor.  Instead, the monster clung to a lane line, too scared to even swim away.  He was so scared that he forgot how to swim.

It’s time for my nap and shenanigans; I have to recharge after this morning’s sprint group workout.  I hope you enjoyed reading, because I sure have enjoyed the last fourteen minutes, which is how long I spent writing this.

Only 109 days until Arbor Day!

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