’Dogs struggle against MSU

The men's and women's swimming teams and the new-look coaching staff visited Missouri State University in a dual meet Saturday in Springfield, Mo., but the 'Dogs did not fare well.

The men fell 153-48 and the women 148-57 to the Div. I Bears, but  interim head coach Jennifer Godlewski said she thought her team did what they wanted to do while swimming against stiff competition.

"Dual meets are kind-of trial runs, times to play with the races, so that it comes automatically in championship meets," Godlewski said. "[Dual meets] are the time to make tweaks and changes as far as race strategy.

Truman's swim team currently is ranked 19th in the CSCAA Div II poll.

Senior Anna Grinter was the only Bulldog to place first with a time of 2:09:67 in the 200-meter butterfly, and in the same race, senior Tanya Sylvester finished third in 2:13:70.

Freshman Casey Jepsen was one of the second-place finishers for the 'Dogs as she swam the 200-meter freestyle in 1:56.66 and junior Jessica Jenkot was second in the 50-meter freestyle. Sophomore Stacey Wymer finished second in the 200-meter back-stroke. The 400-meter freestyle relay composed of freshman Bailey Peterson, senior Carina Pautz, Sylvester and Jepsen also finished second.

Godlewski said the team as a whole has good endurance but is lacking speed. She said a dual meet's purpose is to gauge yourself in a competitive atmosphere.

"We've been training a lot of yardage, a lot of intensity, with speed not necessarily being a focus," Godlewski said. "The next couple weeks [of training] are really critical."

Godlewski said this first meet benefited her more than anyone as it was the first time she had seen her swimmers compete out of practice.

"It was a very good experience for me to watch the races," Godlewski said. "Seeing the times and then watching them are two very different things. It was a learning experience watching them."

She said speed will come from speed-based training the team will do in the next couple of weeks to prepare for the conference meet.

The team usually takes a training trip during Winter Break, but this year due to an abrupt coaching change the trip was canceled. Grinter said she thought there were some benefits to not taking a trip she described as "exhausting" and "intense" in the middle of a long season.

"I think a lot of people came back from the break with charged batteries and kind of recouped a little bit," Grinter said. "We were ready to train hard when we came back to school."

A new coach in the middle of a season would be difficult to deal with for any team, but Grinter said Godlewski made the transition as smooth as possible.

"She did a really good job of coming in and not wanting to change everything we've been doing, I know we really appreciate that," Grinter said. "She's been really understanding and incorporating some of Mark's old workouts with some of her own, and we all really appreciate her coming in the middle of the season."

The men's team had three second-place finishers in individual races with sophomores Jerod Simek in the 500-meter freestyle, Taylor Frymire in the 50-meter freestyle and Michael Hernandez in the 200-meter breaststroke. The 400-meter medley relay team of Hernandez, Frymire, sophomore Greg Taplin and freshman Eric Mikolajczyk finished second as well.

Senior Jonathan Temple said that in two to three weeks, each of the swimmers will begin to taper their workouts to be fully rested for the conference meet, which begins Feb. 9 in Cleveland, Miss.

Each swimmer tapers their workouts based on the distance of their event, Temple said. Short-distance sprint swimmers begin to taper their workouts as much as three weeks before a big meet and distance swimmers taper their workouts for as little as one week.

Truman has swum against Missouri State for several years now, but the Bulldogs have not had much success on the score sheet against the Bears. The men lost against Missouri State the last three times the teams have met, with the most recent being listed first, by scores of 92-30, 102-9 and 168-104.

Truman has two home meets this weekend. The men's team will take on Missouri University of Science and Technology at 6:30 p.m. tomorrow at home. Both teams will also be in action 1 p.m. Saturday against Drury University, the defending national champion.