The ad left lane 8.
Mackenzie Looze had her full attention ready and focused on this week’s Phillips 66 National Championships in Irvine, California, where she is one of the competitors in five events.
The Bloomington South graduate and near-graduate of Indiana University will take credit for a fifth year due to COVID-19 to make her time as a Hoosier bigger. The last two seasons have already been busy after coming out of COVID and being herself again. : two school seasons around last summer’s Olympic trials; and now the nationals to come.
Reserve it for one more competition, a very vital competition, because it means representing your country against one of the biggest rivals in American swimming. The Dual in the Pool will take place in Sydney, Australia, august 19-21 and in the US. UU. La list of 27 swimmers will come with 3 locally connected swimmers, Looze and Indiana Swim Club athlete Annie Lazor, as well as Paralympic athlete Lizzi Smith of Muncie.
“I had no idea I had a chance to come to this meeting,” Looze said. “Then, last Wednesday (July 13), the email was sent and my parents called me and were crying to tell me that I decided on this competition, how I will be able to constitute the United States.
“It’s overwhelming. That’s how wonderful it is. “
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Looze didn’t know exactly how he earned his place. She had a smart performance in the foreign team events this summer, finishing fourth in the two hundred IM (2:13. 28), fifth in the 400 IM (4:44. 95), sixth in the 200 breaststroke (2:27. 60) and 7th in the 100 breaststroke (1:08. 83). It has not yet been revealed on what occasions it will be swimming and possibly not even know it until the competition, but its instant messaging capability makes it a flexible asset.
“I can honestly say it’s a dream come true that I’ve had for a long time,” Looze said. anyone’s ability selected for something like this, so knowing that dreaming like this is one more feeling than you’ve ever felt.
“And I may never have achieved something like this without my coaches and my team and all the other glorious people I have in my corner. “
Looze has been a swimmer all her life and has completed many things, but this is the first time for her, as she realized that her father, Ray, trained athletes all over the world. Having Lazor with you on the journey makes it better.
“I’ve never been to Australia,” Looze said. The flight is so long. But I am very happy to have this delight and share it with Lazor, she is one of the professional athletes of the team and I have immense respect for the professional athletes who dedicate their lives to this sport.
“Lily King is an amazing person. Annie and Lily gave up a lot of things to win professionally, and sharing the area with them is inspiring. “
Another explanation for why being excited is that foreign joy will bring her, she deserves other opportunities to be part of some other American team. you can see what it’s like to travel to the other side of the world while staying focused on a competitive situation.
But there’s nothing like doing it. And that makes her a resource for her teammates who may win a similar opportunity in the future.
“It’s what I can bring back my team in the next season. “
Looze is taking credit for the fifth year of eligibility awarded to athletes through the NCAA due to COVID.
Normally, he would have graduated this year with his major in Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences, but went ahead and added a major in psychology to his undergraduate studies to suspend his graduate studies until his eligibility runs out and give him a more powerful application when it comes time to examine speech treatment outside of IU.
She needs to teach and a speech-language pathologist.
She doesn’t know where swimming can take her, but she loves the concept of reading and living in a large metropolitan area, like Chicago. But he also has a strong need to go back and take care of some unfinished business at the pool.
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“A lot of us ended the year disappointed because we didn’t win the Big Ten,” Looze said. “That’s still the purpose and it wasn’t carried out even though we did well and we were very excited. “
“But we started this year with a chip on our shoulders, with our eyes on this meeting. We will come together and together. August 22 is the start of the season and we have a lot of other people who are excited. “to the hard paintings. “
Last summer, Looze had the chance to compete in the Omaha Olympic Trials, finishing 10th in the semifinals of the two hundred breaststrokes. She placed in the top 20 in the two hundred m IM and 100 m breaststroke and also competed in the 400 m IM and two hundred butterfly.
In her senior year, she won All-American honors in 3 events, ranking 12th in the two-hundred-yard breaststroke, 13th in the two hundred IM and as host of the 800-yard freestyle relay, which ranked 15th. He also competed in two other relay races. He also named an All-Big Ten team for the time being, anchoring the 800 freestyle relay to the moment position and an educational record, ranking fourth in the two hundred IM and sixth in the 400 IM.
It’s a long way back just to get it right.
“I would say I didn’t start very strong,” Looze said of his first year after the pandemic break. “COVID has hit me hard, as well as a lot of people. I am the type of swimmer who wants frames, frames, frames, frames for months to be well prepared for the championships.
“Having so much free time really hurt me. But with my team’s to be able to face the stage and triumph over those difficulties. We all fight each other and we fight each other. “
But it took about a year to get rid of it and get back to where it was.
“After the Olympics, I had a hard time swimming,” Looze said. “I didn’t do very well, but I may see Lily, Annie and other team members qualify for the Olympics. That means you’re in the most sensitive 0. 00001% and to be able to see this is an amazing thing, even if I wasn’t doing it right myself.
“I witnessed that and took that momentum from that assembly and just decided, why not paint as hard as I can for as long as possible?I tell myself this in practice, to remind myself to make as much effort as possible. “, that’s all you can ask yourself. That’s the technique I took on last season.
She also focused on the larger image and her position in it, which required her to be in it so that the Hoosiers could be in her womb.
“Consistency,” Looze said. Be consistent with what the coaches have asked of me. I just sought to illustrate that and do the most productive and the most productive to serve the team and be able to accomplish things that I didn’t think I could do, like do the assembly I decided on.
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“I didn’t think, I had to be the most productive or no. 1, I thought I was looking for my team to be good, for my team to be No. 1 and they were looking to have strong women. That meant I had to be a strong woman, because if I can be a strong woman and everyone else can, it makes our team better. “
He’s doing everything he can to be strong, not just this week at Irvine at the Phillips 66 National Championships, but for the next few weeks as he travels to Colorado Springs to practice, rather than the three-week break he had planned. he will board a plane on August 11 en route to Sydney.
“This assembly is a big problem, because they need to confront us and we have to confront them,” Looze said. Fun.
“It’s foreign relations. It’s competition, but it’s also a chance to communicate and learn about careers I wouldn’t necessarily have experienced. Australians are Array swimmers. And to get that wisdom and experience, too, will be incredible. “
Contact Jim Gordillo at jgordillo@heraldt. com and he on Twitter @JimGordillo.
“without a doubt in my mind, I absolutely take every opportunity to take the fifth year, I love my team, men, women, love so incrediblely, even in a senior state assembly that astomspsher created for our team, I had national cups, another 30 people go to the national assembly, absolute entry,
if you feel better,
strength, is immeasurable, to