Joey
Gochnour- All American
By Douglas
Lee
Magis Sports Writer
Jesuit’s
Joey Gochnour was selected to the USA Swimming’s
2002-03 Scholastic All-American team last month.
The All-American team consists of 272 high school students
around the US including 12 from the gulf area. To qualify,
swimmers
need to maintain a GPA of 3.5 or better and attend a competitive
USS sectional meet.
Joey competed at a sectional meet held at Southlake Texas
at
Carroll High School this past July and August. He competed
in
two events including the 100 m breast and 200 m breast.
"This is a great honor that only a few high school swimmers
receive
in the nation, so I’m very proud to be part of the USS
All-American,”
said Joey. This status/honor will help Joey get into some
of the
universities he is looking at.
"Coaches don’t just want good swimmers. They want
students who
can handle school work. Swimming is a sport that demands a
lot of dedication, so swimmers need to be able to manage their
time. Students
who flunk out of classes will not help the team,” said
Joey.
Some of the colleges that Joey is looking at include Georgetown,
Washington University in St. Louis, Emory, and Trinity. These
schools
all have very competitive swimming programs that are either
Division I
or Division III.
Joey has been swimming for competitions ever since he was
5 years old.
In sixth grade, he joined the Alief Aquatic Club which holds
practice at Hasting and Elsik’s Natatorium.
Joey said, “I choose to practice with the Alief Club
because the practice is demanding and challenging. I’ve
also been swimming with the club for a
long time so I didn’t really want to break my routine.
However, if Strake’s swim practices start taking place
in the morning like the water polo
practice, I’ll also practice with Strake.”
Swimming practices are demanding. Each practice begins with
a warm
up that is usually about 1000 yards. The swimmers then eventually
work
on various sets that lead to the main set, an event that can
be up to 5000 yards.
Joey says, “Most people don’t understand how demanding
swimming is.
We swim about 8200 yards, or about 8200 football fields, every
practice.
After the practice we’re pretty much worn out, and we
still need to go
back to our daily routines and finish up our school work.
Swimming
requires a lot of endurance, patience, and time management.”
Sometimes practices can also include workouts on land such
as
running and weights.
Joey says, “I don’t take any protein supplements.
I’m more into getting
my nutrition from real natural food. My snack between meals
is usually something of high energy such as spaghetti.”
Joey says that although being a swimmer has taken up a major
portion
of his time, he’s enjoyed every minute of it.
“My high school experience was truly enriching. Yes,
I’m extremely
worn out after two hours of practice and still have to work
on an
extremely heavy load of school work (Joey took Physics and
AP
Chemistry II junior year). However, the sense of accomplishment
I get completely makes up for the fatigue. At the end of the
day, you just feel extremely good about your self.”
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