BROOKINGS – The 2022 Speedo Junior National Championships were recently held in Irvine, Calif. and Brookings’ Cody Vertin was among the competitors.
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BROOKINGS – The 2022 Speedo Junior National Championships were recently held in Irvine, Calif. and Brookings’ Cody Vertin was among the competitors.
In fact, he was the only swimmer from South Dakota to qualify for the event.
“These are the fastest 18 and under swimmers in the nation,” said Cassie Hendricks, head coach of the Brookings Swim Club, who accompanied Vertin to California. “It’s a pretty big deal to qualify for this swim meet.”
To Hendricks’ knowledge the Brookings Swim Club has not had any member qualify for junior nationals in the last 25 years that the club has existed.
There are two different national events, one in the fall and one in the winter. The summer championships, however, are far more difficult to qualify for as there is just one location where all qualifiers meet up, while in the winter there are two, meaning that the standards are easier to meet.
Not that those standards are easy, regardless of whether it’s the summer or winter nationals.
Vertin qualified for both events at the Speedo Sectionals Championship Meet back in March in Pleasant Prairie, Wisc. Not only was he two seconds under the junior nationals qualifying time in the 200 Meter Breaststroke, which is his top race, but he touched the wall first to win it.
Hendricks says that Vertin qualifying is the result of his motivation to get better every day, a seemingly incessant urge that drives him.
“Cody is one of the most driven people I’ve ever met,” Hendricks said. “His internal motivation is crazy. He will outwork any one on any day. Getting him to slow down and rest sometimes is one of my bigger challenges in coaching him.”
Hendricks recalls one instance of that practice regime that sticks out amongst many.
“During Christmas break last year he made his parents wake up at 3 a.m. to drive him home from Minneapolis to make it back for 7 a.m. workouts,” Hendricks said.
“Cody hasn’t missed a single practice in the last year unless it was because he was at a swim meet,” Hendricks added.