The rest and relaxation of winter break was cut short a week early for the Northeastern swimming and diving team. The girls headed to Key Largo, Fla., for a week of rigorous training and conditioning before competing in the Orange Bowl Swim Classic, one of the many events that surround the annual FedEx Orange Bowl college football game.
Northeastern was victorious in 10 of the 12 events of the day, collecting a total of 613 points, followed by Washington College (482), fellow CAA competitor George Mason (467) and St. Louis (220).
The team endured five hours of training per day in the week leading up to Saturday’s meet.
“They did great,” head coach Roy Coates said. “They handled it great physically and mentally.”
Structurally, Coates said the training regiments remained similar to those practiced at home; the workload was doubled for more chances to work individually on technical aspects than usual.
“[Times] were pretty good,” said freshman Alexandra Doty, who took first in both the 50 and 100-meter backstrokes, “especially after all the extra training. We all did pretty well.”
Despite two first place spots in the 50 and 100-meter breaststrokes, freshman Elena Alvarez was less optimistic about her performances.
“That’s the most I’ve ever swam in my life. We were beat down physically. When you [train] that much it’s hard to perform well,” Alvarez said. “I’m not too worried though. We got lots of training done.”
Northeastern entered blindly into Saturday’s meet, which offered three fresh competitors: Washington College, George Mason and St. Louis.
“We didn’t really know what to expect,” Doty said.
The team didn’t know much about the meet until the day it took place, and was excited to finally swim against another team in the conference, Alvarez said.
“George Mason was interesting,” Coates said. “They were conference champs in the CAA last year. I don’t know much about them, but we’re about to know them a lot better.”
George Mason will host the CAA conference championships in February.
“We will be very familiar with the competition,” Coates said.
Key Largo offered great weather and competition, he said.
“We usually go to Puerto Rico because of more dependable weather, but I’d certainly consider going back.”
Northeastern begins its final three regular season meets Saturday with a meet against Dartmouth before the conference championships in February.
