Season Update

The 2009 swim season is almost half way over. Where does the time go? We have had some great events and some very exciting meets. We are 4-1 in dual meets and 2-0 in invitational. We had the most exciting meet I have ever seen against Minnetonka. We went in to their brand new pool as the underdog. It was a classic battle of two strong teams. We led early, but then trailed anywhere form 1-10 points throughout the meet. We fought our way through the meet and going into the last relay, it was tied, 86-86. To prep you for the end of this story, we had been to an invitational just 5 days prior at this same pool. During the last relay it came down to Minnetonka and us, and we lost. But one thing we had on our side, we had our top sprinter on this relay, and she had not swum it the weekend before. We informed our girls of this fact, “we win the relay, we win the meet, simple as that.” The nerves and adrenaline in the building was insane. I have never felt so excited/nervous/helpless as a coach. You want so badly for the girls to swim well, to race and to feel a sense of accomplishment. The relay started and the place was on fire. Parents in the stands were stomping their feet, all girls were lined around the pool jumping up and down and screaming. It was hard to hear your own thoughts. Long story short, we did it. We kicked it in and won by over a full second and a half. It was our second best time ever in Wayzata history and if we have been at our home pool we would have shattered our pool record by 4 seconds!
We had another tough battle one week later and were handed our first conference loss. It was Edina. I don’t know what to say about Edina. They have insane talent and just dominated us in the stroke events. We fought hard, but were missing some of the fight we had seen the week prior. We talked about it the next day as a team and came to the conclusion that we need to be mentally tougher as team if we want to be a top team in the state.

Today we had the Maple Grove invitational. It was a two part meet. The morning session was Junior Varsity which we dominated. It was an impressive showing by our young ladies. It really shows how much depth we have when out 5th fastest 400 free relay can still break 4 minutes. The afternoon session went well as we beat Maple Grove and Eden Prairie to win the varsity title as well.
Next up is our final conference meet and then into the True Team meets. I hope to report good news in the coming weeks.

Meet Myles Robert Shimanski

One September 8th, 2009, my brother Steve and his wife Gretchen welcomed Myles Robert after a long 37 hours of labor. Although quite exhausted, all were doing great!

I got to meet Myles when he was on his 4th day of life. He is an amazing little man. He is so adorable and sweet. It was hard to give him back when I had to leave.

I stopped back over two days later on my way home from Madison. I got to feed him and he opened his eyes for a little while to chat. Then back to sleeping, which I think his parents would like to do more of right about now.

Congratulations Steve and Gretchen and look for more updates as I plan to go back in the next couple weeks.

Crandon Pics

The Rhinelander HODAG!!
Robby getting ready to race.

A sweet looking ride

I made the worlds largest banner!!!

We sure did love it!

Wild Weekend in Wisconsin

So I just got home from 5 days in Crandon, WI. I was there for my first big task in my new job. We sponsored Robby Gordon for the weekend in the TORC Truck race and also the NASCAR race in Atlanta. He flew between both places in his private jets. Pretty crazy.
We had a good crew that helped us get Polaris banners all over the raceway.
We had some awesome units on display and also got to hang with Robby's crew. He has his own chef who made us all of our meals. We helped clean the truck and get it ready to race. I had to work most of the time, but did get to go to the Monster VIP lounge and watch some of the races.
My favorite part of the weekend may have been the two laps I got to do in one of the trucks. I was a passenger with one of the racers for a few hot laps. We got some good air and got a little muddy as well. It was so much fun. No idea how fast we got going, but I was holding on for dear life. I was smiling the entire way.
I will post some pics as I get them on my computer later this week.