Bucknell University Athletics
Bucknell Women's Swimming and Diving Blog - Stephanie Koziol
November proved to be just the beginning of the showcase for how much work we have been putting into our training. Coming off a great effort against Pitt in October, both the men’s and women’s teams went into the Quad meet with the motivation to show our league the improvements we’ve been making in and out of the pool. Bucknell walked away the victor of all three dual meets with Lafayette, American, and Navy. We had a great energy on deck and that energy definitely fed into the fast swimming going on throughout the meet. What made that meet even more exciting was the fact that the week’s training leading up to the quad meet was quite possibly the hardest we have had up until that point this season. Everyone truly has been on a roll in practice, whether it’s by putting in great efforts in dryland exercises, in the water, or supporting one another during practice.
We had a two-week break before we raced again, this time at the Bucknell Invitational here in Lewisburg. We expected some competition from last year’s main competitors, but the women had such a great start from the very first race that we easily accumulated enough points to have a comfortable lead the entire weekend. Such a position allowed to people to relax and have fun cheering on the men’s team, which again helped out with the energy on deck and allowed for the fast swimming to continue. The entire women’s team had an overall great weekend with three school records being broken, two of them being an NCAA “B” qualifying times, and multiple season- or career-best times!
What the majority of the team was looking forward to most after the successful Invitational was heading home for Thanksgiving break. The tricky part about this break, and holidays in general, was that it interrupted the consistent training we had had for six weeks. Although many club teams hold practices throughout the holidays, practicing at home is definitely not the same as training with the same program one has become accustomed to. Thankfully, we are now back in Lewisburg gearing up for the dual meet we have up in Hamilton against Colgate this Saturday. This meet will be our last one for the semester as well as the last one until after our training trip. Our goal for the season is to build upon our successes and maintain the roll we’ve been on recently. This weekend will be a great opportunity for us to show how we stack up to another Patriot League rival! Go Bison!
- Stephanie Koziol