November 7, 2018 at 12:39 p.m.
Winnicki eyes personal records at state swim meet
Winnicki eyes personal records at state swim meet
The Hodag sophomore could not care less about the number in the left column of the scoreboard that will show her finishing position. It's the number on the right which will display her time that is of greater concern.
"The main goal is to have fun and drop time," she said Monday at practice.
Winnicki comes in seeded 13th in the state in the 100-yard butterfly and eighth in the 500 freestyle heading into tomorrow's meet at the UW Natatorium in Madison. If things fall into place a top-six finish, and a spot on the podium, in the 500 freestyle is not out of the question. But, to accomplish that feat, she will likely need to swim faster than she ever has before.
"My 100 fly, I want to go under a minute," Winnicki said, referencing her time of 1 minute, 0.54 seconds in the event in last Saturday's Stevens Point sectional. "Breaking that (barrier) for the first time would be exciting. My 500, I just want to hold my pace of what we were shooting for in practice and just drop time."
As Winnicki and the Hodags found out the hard way at sectionals, a personal-best doesn't guarantee anything in terms of finishing position. Though the team set personal records in a number of events, other teams posted bigger time drops, leaving Winnicki as the team's lone representative in Madison this year.
"You can't control what other kids are going to be doing," coach Jenny Heck said. "Swimmers taper at different times - some for conference, some for sectionals, some not til state. It's hard to predict who's going to swim fast at what time. No one is really quite sure how that's going to pan out until the day of the meet."
Some other notes, heading into tomorrow night's state meet.
One is the loneliest number
It was awkwardly quiet Monday in the Heck Family Community Pool as Winnicki was the only swimmer in the water. Marna Winnicki, her mother and the team's assistant coach, was the only one on deck with Heck away for the day to attend to family matters.
The Hodags were within 1.5 seconds of qualifying in three other events, but fell short of the cutline. Those results included being the 17th-fastest team in the 200 medley relay for a state meet that takes only the top 16.
Makenna Winnicki said the pain she felt for her teammates outweighed the pride of her own personal accomplishments.
"Of course it was exciting to know I was going to state," she said. "But the whole team, even though we were proud of our swim and we swam faster than our seed times, we were all collectively disappointed that we didn't make it. We still swam as fast as we could in the medley and it was still a best time, but it was just a fast year, I guess."
Pick up the pace
Typically, swimmers taper their training heading into big meets. While Winnicki's workouts this week have not been as strenuous as mid-season practice, both she and Heck said the intent was to increase her workload slightly from last week to hopefully hit the sweet spot in the taper Friday night.
"We're going to get her swimming a little bit more and back on track with some more of the pace work and pace sets that she was doing earlier in the season," Heck said. "I think that she'll be ready to go faster than she did (at sectionals). That's the goal."
Added Winnicki, "I feel like the training that we did leading up to conference is the training I need to do now to, hopefully, get another nice time drop."
Familiar foes
While tomorrow night will be Winnicki's first state swim in the 100 butterfly, she's back in the field in the 500-freestyle after placing tied for ninth in the event last year. Her time of 5:21.00 at state last year was a personal best until she went 5:20.83 at sectionals this past Saturday.
That time in the 500 put her in the faster of the two heats for the state meet. She'll be joined by three other swimmers from the Stevens Point sectional in that race.
Tomahawk's Kylee Theiler, who beat Winniski in the 500 at the Great Northern Conference Meet on Oct. 26, is the top seed in the event. Winnicki will be swimming next to Merrill's Trinity Kanitz, who she has raced plenty of times in the youth club circuit.
Having so many familiar faces in the fast heat should be a benefit, she said.
"I feel like some of the swimmers I'm friends with and I've swam with for quite a few years," Winnicki said. "We'll just have fun, because we know each other, but it will also be a nice race with some friendly competition."
Daunting double
The 100 butterfly and the 500 freestyle is considered to be one of the more daunting individual doubles in high school swimming, both because of the strenuous nature of the events and the relatively short amount of rest time between them.
Winnicki is the only swimmer in the D2 field competing in both events. She will have barely 15 minutes from the time she climbs out of the pool in the first heat of the butterfly until she's back on the starting block for the final heat of the 500.
"It's a tough lineup of events, but I've just got to push through it, use the strength and the endurance that we've been training for in practice."
Been there, done that
Qualifying for state last year as a freshman gives Winnicki the knowledge of what to expect tomorrow from the time she wakes up to the time she competes.
"It's always really nerve-wracking the day of, with the sendoff (tomorrow morning at the high school) and everything else," she said. "The ride down, you've just got to get in the zone. It's a 3 1/2-hour drive. You've just got to get your mind in the right place, keep that positive attitude through warm-ups."
Heck said Winnicki's up for the challenge.
"She knows what the state meet is like. She's been there and she knows what to do," Heck said. "I think she's well aware of her competition. She'll research them and their times and she'll be well-prepared for Friday."
Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].
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