The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

VETERAN swimming sensation Arianna Vanderpool-Wallace, preparing for her third appearance at the Olympic Games, is not quite where she wants to be going into Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

But the 26-year-old double qualifier is confident that, by the time the games begin on August 4, she will be at her best.

Over the weekend at the 2016 Arena Pro Swim Series in Charlotte, North Carolina, Vanderpool-Wallace led a quartet of Bahamians in the three-day meet at the Mecklenburg County Athletic Club and hosted by SwimMac Carolina. She came up with a sixth place finish and a pair of fifth place finishes.

Vanderpool-Wallace started off with her fifth in the women’s 50 metre butterfly in 26.49 seconds as her team-mate Dana Vollmer won in 25.87; followed by another fifth in the 100m free in 54.674 with Vollmer again touching the wall first in 53.59. She closed out her meet with her sixth in the 100m free in 54.92.

“It was good. I had some heavy training, so it was good to see where I’m at going into Rio,” Vanderpool-Wallace told The Tribune. “I hope to have a couple more races before Rio, so I will get another chance to see where I am.”

After making history in 2012 as the first Bahamian to make a final in swimming at the Olympics in London, England, Vanderpool-Wallace went on to dominate at the Central American and Caribbean Games in 2014 in Veracruz, Mexico with four gold medals and two meet records before she captured the gold in the 50m free with a meet record along with a bronze in the 100m free at the 2015 Pan American Games in Toronto, Canada winning the gold in the 100m free and 50m fly (in new meet records) as well as the 50m free and 100m fly.

The meet in Charlotte, according to Vanderpool-Wallace, gave her an opportunity to test her skills in both the preliminaries and the finals before she goes to Europe to compete in a couple of events before coming home for the Bahamas Swimming Federation’s Royal Bank of Canada’s National Swimming Championships at the end of June.

“I’m not quite where I want to be, but I know I have a lot more work to do so I’m going to continue to work hard going into Rio,” she stated. “I know there are a couple of small things that I need to work on to get better, but hopefully by the time as Rio comes around, I will be at my best.”

So far, Vanderpool-Wallace has qualified with the A standard for both the 50 and the 100m free, two events she has already received some international acclaim for over the past few years.

“I think honestly, I would just like to swim fast and get on the podium,” she projected. “But if that’s not what God has planned for me, then I will have to see what happens. I just want to swim the best that I can and know that the past four years of training has really been worth it.”

Other Bahamians who participated included Laura Morley, representing Indiana Swim Team, who placed 24th in the women’s 50m breaststroke in 1:14.04 and 18th in the 50m breaststroke as she got second in the C final.

Joanna Evans, competing unattached, was eighth in the women’s 800m free in 8:44.06.

“I know a couple of other Bahamians have an opportunity to make it,” Vanderpool-Wallace said. “Joanna Evans is just off the A cut in the 800m free, so I know she’s working towards that and Elvis Burrows and Dustin Tynes both have their B cuts, so they have a possibility of going.

“I think they both can swim faster and get their A cut, so there is a possibility that the Bahamas could have another female and at least a male joining me in Rio. So I’m excited for them.”

As for her own personal goals and aspirations, Vanderpool-Wallace said she has taken a lot of the pressure off herself and now she’s just trying to enjoy competing and have fun doing it.

“I love what I’m doing and I love my teammates,” said Vanderpool-Wallace, who is a member of the SwimMac Carolina, headed by David Marsh, her former coach at Auburn University when she competed for the Tigers.

“I appreciate my coaches and everybody around me. My family has also been very supportive of me, so it makes it kind of easy. It’s not going and sitting behind the desk for hours on end doing something that I don’t want to do.  So I think that has kind of helped me to keep my eyes on the prize and work hard every day.”

Among some of her SwimMac teammates, who help to encourage and push her along, are Americans Ryan Lochte, Cullen Jones and Jimmy Feigen, Roy Burch from Bermuda and Kirsty Coventry from Zimbabwe.

“Training has been going great. I’m really focusing on what needs to get done right now,” Vanderpool-Wallace said. “We’re real detail oriented at the moment. So everything is coming together. I really hope to be ready for Rio.”