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CMS head swim coach Charlie Griffiths and eight students from Claremont McKenna College will be heading to Long Beach this summer, to lend a hand in the U.S. Olympic Team Trials, scheduled July 6-14, at the Charter All-Digital Aquatic Centre.
Griffiths will assume the role of operations crew chief, responsible for the efficient operation of the event. For the task, he's assembled a crew of 15 volunteers including CMC swimmers Kelci Barnes '06, Clare Hudson '05, Samantha Kepler '06, Linh Luong '06, Michelle Phillips '05, Lisal Smith '07, Hilary Walters '06, and Jon Wisniewski '07.
Griffiths and students will be assigned such tasks as setting up, then tearing down, marker flags used in certain events. "We're supposed to be like the clean-up crew at Disneyland," Griffiths says, "If we do our jobs well, no one will know we're there."
For the first time in U.S. Olympic Teams Trials, builders are constructing two, 50-meter state-of-the-art above ground pools within the parking lot adjacent to the Long Beach Arena. According to officials, the deck of both pools will be nine feet above the ground, and bleachers will start at that level, giving spectators an "unparalleled view of not only some of the world's best swimmers, but of the Queen Mary and the Long Beach skyline."
In exchange for the work, Griffiths and crew get front-row seats for the action. With organizers expecting sell-outs of the 10,000-seat facility, "we're getting the swimming equivalent of the Jack Nicholson seat at Staples," he said.
Griffiths says the event is the biggest in American swimming, coming just once every four years or so. "I'm interested in seeing how the coaches interact with their swimmers after successes and failures," he says. "And I know the volunteers from the CMS swimming team are eager to hang around with the stars of our sport."
For the event, Griffiths says Speedo will be unveiling its newest suit, the FS-II, the follow-up to the Fastskin suit that received media attention during the 2000 Olympics.
For more information about the trials, visit: http://www.longbeach2004.com/.
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CMS head swim coach Charlie Griffiths
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