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Saturday, December 1, 2007
Where Are They Now?
Fort Worth, TX
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By the age of 16, Dana Vollmer was an Olympic gold medalist and world record holder, creating a rather unique high school experience. She’s now making waves at the collegiate level as a member of the Cal-Berkley swim team.
“It was definitely overwhelming and shocking,” Dana Vollmer says of her time in high school. It’s not often that a world record holder and international swimming star walks the halls of a North Texas high school, but that was the case at Granbury.
Vollmer was part of the USA’s 4x200-meter freestyle relay team that captured a gold medal at the 2004 Athens Olympics, breaking a 17-year-old world record in the process. Previous to the Olympics, Vollmer was home schooled because of the inordinate amount of training involved in her daily schedule, but following the Olympics she returned to Granbury High School.
“Coming back to high school was definitely different than I expected,” she explains. “There’s, of course, drama in high school, so there would be a group of people that I wouldn’t even know that already had judgments about me and kind of thought they knew who I was going to be. It was kind of hard to show the other side, that I’m not just an Olympian and that I can have fun and I am a normal student also.
“It was challenging to portray myself as a 16-year-old girl and also as an Olympian. I am really glad that I went back to high school, though. I loved being with all my friends, but it was definitely different than I think my high school experience would have been.”
Upon graduating from GHS, Vollmer headed off to the University of Florida. But, after her freshman year, she transferred to the University of California, Berkley, where she is presently a junior and serves as a captain of the swim team.
“The coach here, Teri McKeever, is very technical and knows a lot about technique and how the body works and she’s got a different approach to training. Rather than just doing a ton of yardage, which I feel a lot of coaches do, we do a lot of breathing exercises and learning how to manipulate our bodies in the water.”
Vollmer competes in a number of different events, primarily the 50, 100, and 200-yard freestyle and the 100 and 200-yard butterfly. She also has found that competing at the collegiate level is a different beast than swimming at the international level.
“I think college is a lot different. Most international meets are just your one big meet of the year. You have everything set right for that meet. In college, you have so many dual meets that are basically every other weekend that you have to learn to swim fast all the time. You have to learn to swim fast when you’re hurting and when you’re tired.”
Stepping onto the blocks as a gold medal winner, most people swimming against Vollmer are fully aware of her past and her accomplishments. Initially, that was something Dana had difficulty dealing with.
“I feel like I did [have added pressure on me] especially the year after the Olympics,” she explains. “And I think I let that get to me. I would go behind the blocks instead of having fun out there like I used to and really enjoying racing. I felt like I was supposed to win or people expected that of me and that was really hard for me to handle for a while.”
After school, Vollmer would like to swim professionally, but also has her mind set on life outside the pool. She hopes to use her education at Cal to get into cardiovascular research, which is not surprising considering Dana suffers from a heart condition known as Supra Ventricular Tachyardia.
“I want to work with athletes,” she says. “I want to continue to work in sports.”
Vollmer still loves Texas and sees herself coming back eventually, but admits it will all depend on where her swimming and professional career takes her. She wasn’t able to come home to see her family much this year, but will come home for Christmas. Her stay will be short, though, as her team will then embark on a training trip to Australia.
Ultimately, she’d also like to leave a mark on the community that so steadfastly supported her during her run to Athens.
“I definitely feel a huge draw to the town as a whole,” Vollmer says about Granbury. “They’ve given me so much support over the years and sent my parents to watch me at the Olympics. They’ve always continued to be there for me.
“For the high school, I really want to try to get us a pool and a facility. I don’t know how I can do that yet, but I hope to see our facilities get a lot better at the high school.”
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