WEATHER
The 2008 Summer Olympics are on the horizon. It’s one of the most highly anticipated global competitions many countries look forward to every four years. And we’re no different. The Gig Harbor area will send three athletes to the U.S. Olympic trials in the coming weeks for a chance to represent the country.
Gig Harbor High School senior Katarina Batina will go to Oklahoma City, Okla., in two weeks for a chance to be on the U.S. Olympic Canoe and Kayak team. Batina is a kayak racer and a member of the Gig Harbor Canoe and Kayak Club.
The club will send eight others who hopes to qualify for the Pan-American games in March in Montreal, Canada.
Peninsula High School junior Lindsey Marchand is a young but elite swimmer shooting for a spot on the Olympic team. She will compete at the Olympic trials in Omaha, Neb., in the 100-meter butterfly and potentially more.
South Kitsap High School graduate and Port Orchard resident John Mullins was selected as an alternate for the U.S. Olympic trap shooting team.
He left for Beijing, China, with two other trap shooters earlier his week.
Top three accomplishments
Making the alternate position on the U.S. Olympic Team in the open competition.
Winning a bronze medal at the 2003 Junior Olympic championships.
Taking the bronze medal at the U.S. national championships.
Mullins, 20, is not a military man. He is, however, just as skilled as a shooter — if not better than some trained snipers — with a shotgun.
Mullins trained for a week with the Army Marksmanship Unit in Columbus, Ga., earlier this month.
But he wasn’t training for over-seas combat.
Rather than traveling to Iraq or Afghanistan, Mullins left on April 7 for Beijing as he prepares for world competition.
A Port Orchard man with an eagle eye and incredible hand-eye coordination, Mullins is an alternate for the U.S. Men’s Trap Shooting Olympic Team.
Mullins could get a shot at competing if one of his teammates is unable to compete. Mullins’ goal is to become one of the two shooters for the 2012 London Games.
Having grown up on the peninsula, Mullins began practicing at the Gig Harbor Sportsman’s Club. Starting when about 8, he tagged along with his parents as they competed.
It wasn’t until 2003 when Mullins began to compete nationally. He stepped up his shooting game two years later when he began competing internationally.
Mullins said he was 14 when he knew he had a God-given talent. He wanted to make the best of it.
Mullins won the state title in one event in trap shooting — the handicap championship — which excludes long-distance shooting.
“It felt really nice to know I could compete with the experienced trap shooters at their level,” he said. “It was a very good confidence-booster that I could compete along side of them.”
Since then, Mullins has set higher goals — and achieved all of them except earning one of the two spots for the U.S. Olympic team.
Mullins said he has won a handful of championship titles, including the Junior National championships last June in Texas.
As a young adult competing against middle-aged men, Mullins could be viewed as out of his league. But his father, Tim, and his mother, Linda, who are accomplished American trap shooters themselves, have coached him into becoming a committed shotgun shooter.
“My goal is to keep training with the U.S. Olympic team and keep training for another four years for another Olympic trial,” Mullins said.
Top three accomplishments
Swimming one minute flat in the 100-meter butterfly at the Western U.S. Sectional Meet, putting her in the Top 50 swimmers in the world.
Making an Olympic trials cut in August 2007.
Making her first nationals cut in January 2007 in Indianapolis.
Marchand, 17, has a story similar to one of the greatest — if not the greatest — basketball players in history, Michael Jordan.
Marchand’s story began when she was about 7. She expressed interest in swimming after her grandfather, Ray Totten, introduced her to swimming lessons when she was 4.
Flashing back is much easier for her to do, knowing she has qualified for a chance to be on the U.S. Olympic Swimming Team in August 2007. Marchand will swim at the Olympic trials June 29 in Omaha, Neb.
In the 100-meter butterfly last summer, Marchand swam one minute, 0.20 seconds at a national meet in Indianapolis that made her eligible for the trials.
Marchand is among 50 swimmers from across the country vying for just two spots on the Olympic team in the 100 fly.
The highly touted U.S. swim team will send 25 men and 25 women to the Beijing Games.
And while the fly is Marchand’s strongest stroke, she is ranked in the Top 25 in nearly every other stroke in the country.
“Training just fly is detrimental,” said the 5-foot-9 Marchand who has a 6-2 wingspan. “It wears out fly muscles. This year, I’ve been training more strokes and less fly. I’ve seen more results.”
While her chances of making the Olympic team may be slim, she believes trying her best and not over-analyzing her approach is key.
Swimming accolades
Marchand’s swimming resume is impressive for a high school junior. She’s a member of the King Aquatic Club, a group of about 400 swimmers that includes athletes who have won Olympic medals, with Sean Hutchison as its head coach.
Marchand has been training with Hutchison since August 2005.
Working with a large group of elite swimmers has paid off, so far: Marchand has made six senior national cuts, including four junior national times and one Olympic standard.
Like many young but promising athletes, Marchand believes she will have a better chance of making the Olympic team in another four years.
“That’s the only way you improve,” she said about not being content with her accomplishments. “If you stop, you never hit the next one.”
Leading up to the Olympic trials are a series of three meets at Stanford, Calif., Santa Clara, Calif., and then Omaha. The series of meets — considered to be a grand prix — are important for Marchand, because they give her a chance to shave more seconds off her time.
If she has an outstanding performance, she can still qualify for another Olympic trials event in another stroke, such as the 200 individual medley or 100 backstroke.
Olympic appearance
It was in Alabama during her fledging career as a swimmer when Marchand’s father, Mike, and her mother, Cindy, put her in a pool of older swimmers.
Marchand was 9, and she was lapped twice in 200 meters.
She was simply too slow and faced an option of quitting — just like when Michael Jordan was cut from the varsity basketball team as a sophomore at Emsley A. Laney High School, because he was too short.
But Marchand told herself she would never come in last place again, and she became determined to elevate her skills.
Marchand didn’t have instant success. Instead, it was a gradual improvement between ages 9 and 14 that eventually led her to the Olympic Trials.
Mike Marchand said Lindsey has taken each race one at a time.
“She’s good because she’s determined to be the best,” her father said.
Not only is she physically gifted and very flexible, Hutchison said she’s a smart swimmer with good technique.
A demanding schedule
Marchand practices every day, and twice on Tuesdays. Her coach uses a number of different exercises, such as a pulley system and parachutes inside the water for stronger tension.
Marchand is also on a strict diet. She said there are about three weeks out of the year when she doesn’t train.
And she usually isn’t allowed to go on family vacations because it interferes with her training schedule.
Marchand takes a handful of supplements to increase cell structure, lung capacity and more.
“Sometimes I feel like it’s ‘Go, go, go,’ ” she said. “But I go into every race, and I try and do the best I can.”
Marchand’s swimming ability surfaced three weeks ago when she splashed into the world rankings — tremendously: Last March at the King County Aquatic Center in Federal Way, Marchand swam the 100 butterfly in one minute flat during the Western U.S. Sectional Meet.
The time put her in the top 50 in the world.
So far, she’s surpassed many of her own expectations. But she’s still hungry for more, and she said she won’t stop until she reaches the podium.
Marchand hasn’t decided which college she would like to attend. Chances are, she’ll head to a Division I school along the West Coast.
After her competitive swimming career comes to a close, Marchand said she’d like to pursue a career involving math.
Top three accomplishments
Being selected as a member of the junior world championship team in 2007.
Competing in the Junior Olympics in 2007 in Australia.
Winning the national championship last year in combined team points.
The Gig Harbor Canoe and Kayaking Club has stellar individual and team accomplishments. However, only one of its members earned the right for a shot at making the U.S. Olympic team this year.
Batina, 18, has been a member of the GHCK team since its inception five years ago. Last August, the team won the Junior National championships, which were held in Seattle.
Ranked as the No. 2 junior athlete in the country last year, Batina will go to Oklahoma City to compete in the Olympic trials on April 18-20.
“This year I want to go to the Olympic trials and get as much experience and dissect the situation,” she said.
Batina said her chances of making the Olympic team are pretty narrow. If she doesn’t make it, she plans to continue training for the 2012 summer Olympics in London.
But that hasn’t stopped her from absorbing as much experience as possible.
Batina believes the type of competition in Oklahoma City will better prepare her for the future.
The U.S. team will send its top 10 kayakers to Beijing this year.
Paddling to the Olympics
In the seventh grade, Batina took up kayaking with no committed plans. But her older sister was a rower.
Batina said seeing her sister in the water created some level of interest.
Amid three different sports, including soccer, kayaking is the one in which Batina excelled. She said she realized in 2006 that she had the potential of reaching the elite level.
Batina became a member of the U.S. junior national team and began to travel the world. It broadened her life experiences at a relatively early age and exposed her to even higher levels of competition.
The traveling opportunities, she said, were a nice perk to getting into the sport.
As a young adult, she’s traveled to more countries than many people will ever visit. She said her greatest cultural experience was in Slovakia last year in a small town called Komarno.
“Although they are far from wealth, some of the fastest K-4 (four-man kayak team) comes out of that town,” she said in a humbled tone. “What it (kayaking) means to other places is very interesting.”
Last year, five members of the GHCK went to the Czech Republic to compete in the junior world championships, where they placed 17th.
Bred for success
Batina has had an atypical teenage life: Since she was about 12, she’s been training to become a world-class kayaker.
That hard work may pay off even if she doesn’t make the Olympic team if she’s offered a partial or full scholarship to either the University of Washington or the University of San Diego, her top two choices.
At 5 feet 10 and a toned 130 pounds, Batina said she would like to gain more muscle and weight. She said most women who win medals in kayaking are roughly 145 to 150 pounds.
But defying the odds is what motivates her. Batina is a person who is focused on her personal and team goals.
With a lengthy stature and long arms, Batina’s physical makeup gives her an advantage many kayakers don’t naturally have. She said she’s working to improve muscle strength as she practices in the water every day — twice a day, in many cases.
It’s the life of an athlete who is training to make the U.S. Olympic team.
“I don’t live a life of a teenage girl,” she said. “It’s my identity. In school, I’m the girl who kayaks.”
Batina is showing an example of her passion for the sport this year: She’s using her love for the sport and passing it on by becoming an assistant coach — and to fulfill her senior project at the same time.
Outside of her busy kayaking life, Batina is also thinking about a future career in international business. An outdoorsy person, she also likes to surf and has recently picked up cycling.
The GHCK will travel to Oklahoma City in a couple weeks to attempt to qualify for the Pan-American games May 15-18 in Montreal, Canada.
Emily Winskill — As a junior last year, she competed for one of two K-2 spots on the U.S. Pan-America team.
Annie Truscott — Attends the Tacoma School of the Arts and also competed for a K-2 spot.
Katy Hill — Ranked No. 1 in the juvenile (under 16) division and competed for the K-1 and K-2 entry in the Pan-American games.
Abbie Barber — At 15, she is competing in the juvenile division and is ranked No. 2 in the country. She may choose not to attend the Pan-American Games but will attempt to qualify for a special camp in Lake Placid, N.Y.
Cedric Bond — Ranked No. 1 in the country in the junior division. Due to an injury, Bond will not compete in the Pan-American Games but will attempt to qualify for the Lake Placid camp.
Zac Johnson — a Bellarmine Preparatory School student who has a shot to qualify for the New York camp.
Brian Stopoulous — Another juvenile with a shot at the New York camp.
The coach for the GHCK team is Alan Anderson. His assistant is Jack Lincke. The GHCK is a non-profit organization.
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