Finding Ultra (6 page)

My goal times could be found written in giant block letters on my school notebooks, inside my school locker, and pasted on my bathroom mirror. And every inch of the corkboard that blanketed an entire wall of my bedroom was covered with glossy pictures and posters of my heroes torn from the pages of
Swimming World
magazine—world record holders and Olympic champions such as Rowdy Gaines, John Moffet, Jeff Kostoff, and Pablo Morales. Of all the photographs my favorite was the one of speed skater extraordinaire Eric Heiden in his golden bodysuit—a shot that appeared on the cover of
Sports Illustrated
during the 1980 Winter Olympic Games in Lake Placid. With leg muscles the size of tree trunks, Heiden had completely rewritten the record books in almost every speed skating event, from sprint to distance, garnering five gold medals in the process. Sure, he wasn't a swimmer, but in my mind he was the very essence of athletic virtue and excellence.

I couldn't have been older than fifteen when I read in the
Washington Post
that a professional bike race would be held on the “Ellipse”—a large oval stretch of road picturesquely facing the White House on Washington's Mall, the expanse of green that was
part of French architect Pierre-Charles L'Enfant's famous design for our nation's capital. At that point, Eric Heiden had made a rare transition from speed skating to pro cycling, and he'd be competing with his 7-Eleven Team, America's first top professional outfit. I dragged my dad to the race and watched intensely. I think Dad was bored, but I'd never seen such athletic pageantry. Whipping around the looped course at impossible speeds, the tightly packed group of riders known as the “peloton” captivated me, their spinning wheels a beehive-purr soundtrack to the rainbow blur of the brightly colored jerseys careening past. After the race, I snuck through security to get close to the 7-Eleven Team van, catching glimpses of Heiden casually chatting with reporters. Never before, and never since, have I been so starstruck. And in that moment, I fell in love with the sport of cycling. I wanted to race bikes. But I didn't know any other kids who raced. And the timing was all wrong. I didn't possess nearly enough bandwidth for this aspiration if I wanted to excel as a swimmer. And so for the next twenty-five years it would remain nothing more than a dream deferred.

I was forced to manage my rigorous schedule with extreme precision. While my classmates stayed out late, experimenting with drugs and alcohol and enjoying parties that I wasn't invited to, with the girls from Landon's sister school, Holton Arms, I maintained a strict regimen of studying, sleeping, training, and racing. Even if I
had
been invited to the parties, I would have declined, if for no other reason than that I was just too damn tired. And so, by default, I became the model son and student. During the week I had no free time—just swim, school, eat, swim, study, sleep. And even on the weekends my goals didn't allow me to get into any trouble. Most weekends were spent traipsing up and down the East Coast to compete in meets, from Tuscaloosa to Pittsburgh to Hackensack.
For competitions within driving range, my parents would dutifully load up the wagon and haul me—and often my sister, who'd now joined me in the pool and would become an outstanding swimmer in her own right—to endless meets that, for a spectator, were about as exciting as watching grass grow.

But the work quickly began to pay off. By the time I was sixteen—a little more than a year since I'd joined Rick Curl—I'd achieved my goal of obtaining a national ranking, landing eighth in the country for my age in the 200-meter butterfly. I was qualifying for national-level meets and traveling all over the country to compete. At these competitions I was coming into contact with many of the swimming legends who'd graced my bedroom wall. I still recall my first junior nationals in Gainesville, Florida, in 1983. Two days into the weeklong meet, I spotted Craig Beardsley, then a student at the University of Florida, casually walking the pool deck. A member of the ill-fated 1980 Olympic team that missed the chance to compete due to President Carter's boycott of the Moscow Games, Craig was the reigning world champion in my specialty, the 200-meter butterfly. Undefeated in the event since 1979, he'd held the world record for more than three years running. To say he was my hero is an understatement. In awe, I followed him but was too afraid to approach. Sensing someone shadowing him, Craig turned around to see what I was up to. But I was much too overwhelmed to talk to him and made a quick exit—unfortunately, into the women's bathroom!

But I didn't care.
Holy cow, Craig Beardsley looked at me!
I felt that I'd arrived in the elite world of swimming.

During this time I began to excel academically as well, clawing my way up to the top of my class. In particular, I fell in love with biology, hatching a dream for a career in medicine. Out of necessity, my tight schedule focused my schoolwork, which translated
into excellent grades. Socially, I left well enough alone at Landon and increased my time spent with my swim club teammates, forging long-lasting friendships with kids who shared my passion. All told, my master plan was working.

By my senior year, I was established as one of the top high school swimmers in the country. The only feather missing from my cap was a win at “Metros”—the D.C.-area high school championships. But I faced one major obstacle. I wasn't eligible to enter this meet because Landon lacked a swim team. No high school swim team, no high school championships. So once again, I made an unwelcome return to Athletic Director Lowell Davis's office, this time with a petition to form Landon's first swimming program. Maybe he resented that outside his control I'd become one of the area's best athletes, because once again he threw up a roadblock. No matter what I did, I just couldn't win with this guy. So it was back to Headmaster Coates for another appeal. With his help, I became Landon's “team of one.” And by exploiting a few loopholes in the high school swimming league rule book, I qualified for the championship meet by piggybacking into a few high school dual meets. Essentially, I crashed a party I wasn't invited to.

At Metros, I was forced to strut my stuff in the shorter sprint distance, the 100-yard butterfly; the 200-yard butterfly is not a high school event. The 100 wasn't my specialty—with butterfly, as well as with triathlon later in life, the longer the distance the better—but I was determined to win anyway. Unfortunately, once again I came up a hair shy, finishing second to my Curl teammate Mark Henderson (who would later win gold at the 1996 Olympics, swimming the butterfly leg of the United States' world-record-setting 4×100 medley relay). Coming in second was becoming a habit.

I may not have won that race, but I proudly represented my school that day, even though some there had been reluctant to
support me. And what was most gratifying was that my persistence, buttressed by a top performance, set the stage for Landon to found an official swimming team the following year—a team that exists to this day. I may have been exempt from Landon's sports program, but my athletic legacy there nonetheless remains.

My Metros results, combined with my national rankings, were more than sufficient to catch the attention of top university programs. And with A's across the board and enrollment in every advanced placement course available, my chances of college acceptance were nearly bulletproof. Even so, I worked hard on my applications, crafting an esoteric essay on my knack for persistence and love affair with water, and I even included an underwater photo of me, my smile distorted by the turquoise current. Soon the coaches began calling, and I quickly got a taste of college life as I jetted around the country on all-expenses-paid recruiting trips.

First up was the University of Michigan, a top-notch university and home to a swimming program with a legendary history, then led by my favorite coach in the sport, the popular and über-talented Jon Urbanchek, who'd later go on to coach the 2004 and 2008 U.S. Olympic swimming teams. As a native of the state, my Wolverine roots run deep. Not only had my mother and father both attended U of M, so had many of my cousins, aunts, and uncles. As a family, we bleed maize and blue.

But by far the most important person in my extended family to attend Michigan was my grandfather on my mother's side, Richard Spindle. During the late 1920s, Richard had led the University of Michigan swimming team to an array of Big Ten Conference championships and countless individual victories under the tutelage of venerable coach Matt Mann, who noted at the time, “The
University of Michigan swimming team of 1926–27 is the greatest team ever organized by any college.”
^*
And my grandfather was a standout that season, setting the national record in the 150-yard backstroke. That feat made him an Olympic hopeful for the 1928 Summer Games in Amsterdam, along with the most famous swimmer of the day, Johnny Weissmuller—who would later achieve
Tarzan
fame on the silver screen. Ultimately, my grandfather came up short, missing his Olympic berth by one place when he finished fourth in the trials. But he remains one of the great swimmers of his time—a true legend, who completed his career as captain of the Michigan squad during his 1929 senior year.

Adorning the hallways of the world-class Matt Mann Natatorium on the Ann Arbor campus are many team photos dating back to my grandfather's time. And if you look closely at the photo from 1929, setting aside the sepia tone of the weathered image and the sleeveless wool body suits, my resemblance to my grandpa is beyond eerie. Unfortunately, Richard Spindle died years before I was born, the victim of a genetic predisposition to heart disease that took his life during my mother's college years, at the relatively young age of fifty-four. But despite his never having met his namesake grandson, he's influenced much of who I am today. Though I must rely on my mother's memories to fill out my knowledge of him, it's clear that we shared many things, including most obviously a fascination with water, a competitive fire, and a passion for fitness.

It was my mother's love for the father who was too early taken from her that motivated her to name me after him and imbue my life with the things he loved. It's why she threw me in the pool that
fateful day when I was an infant, and it was a huge factor in her devoted support of my own swimming dreams. I often joke that I'm the reincarnation of Richard Spindle. But in many ways, it's no joke. I feel a spiritual connection to this man; I'm convinced that I'm here to carry on his legacy and complete his unfinished business.

Upon my graduation from college, Mom gave me framed prints of those team photographs. They hang above my desk. For my birthday several years later, she gave me his Michigan letterman's blanket, a dark blue woolly drape with a block “M” in bold maize and his name in elegant cursive embroidery. To this day it lies spread across our bed. Both these gifts are daily reminders of where I came from, who I am, talismans to represent the rationale behind my decision to change my life.

And it was my grandfather's image that came to mind on the eve of my fortieth birthday as I nearly passed out climbing the stairs. I didn't want to die like he did. I
couldn't
. I knew it was my mission to somehow correct in my own life what had gone terribly awry in his. It's because of Richard Spindle that I recommitted my life to expanding the boundaries of health and fitness.

But back to my recruiting trip to Michigan. The visit kicked off with a Friday evening dual meet, where I sat quietly intimidated in the bleachers, watching the team compete as swimmers came by to introduce themselves. I was painfully aware of my undeveloped social acumen, that my conversation was forced and that I failed to make eye contact. Away from my friends at Curl Swim Club, I felt like an utter misfit. I may have loved swimming, but interacting with people had always been difficult for me—especially
new
people. Others my age seemed to display an ease with themselves that left me baffled. As yet, I hadn't realized that very soon I'd find a solution to my problem, albeit one that came with a cost.

After the meet, I was shuffled off to a swimmer party at a local
house. The team had won the meet, and spirits ran high, literally and figuratively. Before I could even remove my coat, a gigantic plastic mug of beer was shoved in my face, a first in my young life, courtesy of Bruce Kimball.

Aptly named the “Comeback Kid,” Bruce was Michigan's top diver, fresh off winning a silver medal at the 1984 Olympic Games in the 10-meter platform. But just three years prior, Bruce had been struck head-on by a drunk driver, breaking his leg and fracturing every single bone in his face. His liver was lacerated and his spleen had to be removed. The scars he wore on his face told the tragic tale well. Everybody knew who Bruce was—his story was legend. And now he was giving me a beer. My first beer.

“Chug it!” Bruce yelped, followed by his teammates. “Chug! Chug! Chug!”

Although I wasn't a diver, I idolized Bruce and what he had overcome to achieve greatness. So there was no way I was going to let him down, despite my hesitation about this strange brew. I'd always prided myself on my teetotaler nature and was apt to be judgmental toward classmates who spent weekends wasted. But this time was different. This time a true sports legend was exhorting me to imbibe. I obliged, tipping the Big Gulp–sized cup back and sucking down all thirty-two ounces until nary a drop was left. Not bad for my first beer ever.

My gut distended, I buckled over, trying to keep it down. But after a moment, my stomach settled. And what I next experienced would change the direction of my life forever. It started with a flush to my head. Then a deep warmth began to course through my veins, as if the softest blanket ever had suddenly enveloped my entire body. And within a heartbeat, all those feelings of fear, resentment, insecurity, and isolation just vanished, replaced with the rush of comfort and belonging.