Day 1 Wednesday August 6th, 7:15 p.m.

Location: Somewhere northwest of the Hudson Bay in Northern Canada.

Some of you are aware that I am traveling today to Beijing, China to attend the 2008 Olympic Games. Right now, if you’re wondering, there isn’t much to see out my window. Not because of clouds or anything. There just isn’t much to see. We’re flying over Canada and what there is to see appears to be tundra and small lakes. Lots of tundra and lots of lakes. I am somewhat surprised to find out that I’m heading to Beijing by flying over Lake Huron, Lake Michigan and the Hudson Bay. The stewardess explained that because of the curvature of the earth, it was actually shorter than following a straight horizontal line across the globe. I guess I knew that. I haven’t had geography for about forty some years and I’m a bit rusty I suppose.

It would seem that in an hour or two we will be flying over Mt McKinley in Alaska too. Given that Mt McKinley is a bit higher than 20,000 ft, all I can hope is that we’re flying at least that high. I haven’t brought much warm clothing and definitely didn’t bring a tent.

Along that line, the weather report in Beijing is just about exactly what it is to be in Bloomington this coming week. Hot (88-92F) and humid (55-70%) with scattered thunderstorms. Because Bloomington and Beijing are about equal in latitude, and neither are particularly near the coast, it turns out that the weather is fairly similar as well. As I will be spending most of my time in the Olympic natatorium, I am not too concerned about the weather outside.

After leaving town, my anticipation has been growing. My first flight was between Indianapolis and Detroit. I didn’t see many people who looked as if they were headed to China on this first flight. However, the mother of the youngest US athlete was on our flight. I heard her comment that her daughter had left earlier this week and that she had yet to get her drivers license.
Once in Detroit, my next flight is now headed to Narita in Japan. There was nearly no lay-over, a good thing given the entire trip will take twenty one hours. On this flight there are many more passengers headed to the Games. This is only an ‘educated’ guess, I admit. However, there are many people who are traveling with backpacks and travel bags with USA, Nike, Speedo, Champion and such prominently embroidered on every square inch.

Today’s Bloomington paper carried an interesting story about one of IU’s better known athletes, Mark Spitz. It turns out that Michael Phelps has a chance to make history by earning eight Olympic gold medals, one more than Mark won in 1972. No athlete in any sport has ever one more ‘golds’ in one Olympic Games than that. It wont be easy as Michael will have to swim 18 times I believe. He swims in 5 individual events with a preliminary heat, semifinal heat and final for each one. In addition, he will swim in 3 relay finals. That is a bunch of swimmin’ and a very difficult task indeed!

Doc Counsilman, Mark’s coach always felt that Mark’s feat might never be equaled in that not only did Mark win seven events, but each swim resulted in a new world record. So, we shall see. If anyone can do it… Michael Phelps certainly seems to be the guy to have a shot at it! We’ll all have to watch and see.

IU athletes are prominent in Olympic swim history in other ways that you are probably not aware of. It turns out that in 1976 Doc Counsilman coached the US Men’s Olympic Swim Team in Montreal, Canada. Among other things, Jim Montgomery became the first man in history to break 50 seconds in the 100 meter freestyle. I’ll have to check on this, but I believe the flag bearer for the USA Olympic Team was swimmer Gary Hall (Sr). If you see Dave Tanner, ask him, he knows these things. I believe Gary was one of Dave’s college roommates and it was Gary’s third Olympic Games.

In any event, Doc’s team was so dominant at these Games that only one non-American swimmer medaled. His name was David Wilkie, a breastroker/IM’er from Scotland and a teammate of mine from the University of Miami. Because of the USA success and across the board dominance, the International Olympic Committee decided to limit the number of qualifiers any country could enter into future swimming events. Traditionally each country could enter three swimmers and subsequently (now) only two. This has led to the USA Olympic Trials becoming the most competitive swim meet in the world.

For the time being, at least, it is the 6th of August. But in Beijing, it is already the 7th, only one day before the Opening Ceremonies. I have been told that spectators are to be at the “Bird Nest” five hours in advance due to the heavy security precautions. As much as I want to see these ceremonies in person, I am not sure I want to stand in 90 degree heat for more than five hours. So, my first images of the Beijing Games might be much like yours… on TV. Am I being a whiny baby?

I have brought with me several CCiST shirts and with any luck I’ll send pictures from Beijing with “iswim” prominently displayed. The goal is clearly to someday have one of our athletes wearing a Counsilman Center “iswim” behind the blocks rather than just sitting in the stands. Dream big.

In the next couple days, I hope to be able to report what I see ad experience once the games begin. One of our team parents, Jay Kincaid, is over here working for NBC. I don’t know that I will be able to find him as he is assigned to the Boxing venue. I suspect that I will see more of China than Jay. I will also try to update you on the upcoming season. Summer always seems to fly by and we face the fall and winter in just a few short weeks.


Stay tuned.