Download or read book Soul of a Swimmer written by Carla Albano and published by . This book was released on 2021-12-13 with total page 170 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Soul of a Swimmer is the true story of Nicholas Dworet, a champion swimmer from Florida. Through interviews with his family, friends, coaches, and teammates, the book fondly describes the lifelong process of nurturing a child who has extraordinary talent and ebullient dreams as he develops into an elite athlete. As Nick matures, a young man with a remarkably humble and genuine character emerges amid his athletic successes. When he was a senior in high school, Nick found his Olympic dreams within reach. But tragically, his life was cut short in the Parkland, Florida, school shooting. Nick's story will resonate with the reader forever.
Download or read book Golden Girl written by Michael Silver and published by Rodale Books. This book was released on 2006-04-18 with total page 314 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The story of Natalie Coughlin's remarkable battle back from injury and burnout to be-come America's Golden Girl—a two-time Olympic Gold Medal winner in swimming and the most decorated female athlete at the 2004 Olympics Five years ago, Natalie Coughlin's promising swimming career was all but extinguished when a devastating shoulder injury ended her dreams for the 2000 Olympics. After becoming, at age 15, the first person ever to qualify for all 14 women's events at the U.S. Nationals, she seemed destined to follow the path of so many other young swimming stars—devoured by an oppressive training schedule. In Golden Girl, Sports Illustrated's Michael Silver—coauthor of many bestselling sports memoirs—including Dennis Rodman's, Kurt Warner's, and Jerry Rice's—tells the story of Natalie's remarkable journey back from the brink. With complete access to her family, friends, coaches, teammates, and adversaries, Silver details how she made the crucial choice to train with University of California coach Teri McKeever. Together the two, star and coach, have defied long-standing training methods, forcing the swimming community to rethink the ways in which it treats its talent. An inspirational story of a complex and courageous young athlete, Golden Girl is also a fascinating portrait of the fractious world of competitive swimming.
Download or read book Swimming Fastest written by Ernest W. Maglischo and published by Human Kinetics. This book was released on 2003 with total page 808 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An illustrated guide to competitive swimming containing detailed overviews of the four primary strokes; racing strategies; and the most effective training methods and the science behind why they work.
Download or read book Haunts of the Black Masseur written by Charles Sprawson and published by Pantheon. This book was released on 2012-08-29 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In a masterful work of cultural history, Charles Sprawson, himself an obsessional swimmer and fluent diver, explores the meaning that different cultures have attached to water, and the search for the springs of classical antiquity. In nineteenth-century England bathing was thought to be an instrument of social and moral reform, while in Germany and America swimming came to signify escape. For the Japanese the swimmer became an expression of samurai pride and nationalism. Sprawson gives is fascinating glimpses of the great swimming heroes: Byron leaping dramatically into the surf at Shelley’s beach funeral; Rupert Brooke swimming naked with Virginia Woolf, the dark water “smelling of mint and mud”; Hart Crane swallow-diving to his death in the Bay of Mexico; Edgar Allan Poe’s lone and mysterious river-swims; Leander, Webb, Weissmuller, and a host of others. Informed by the literature of Swinburne, Goethe, Scott Fitzgerald, and Yukio Mishima; the films of Riefenstahl and Vigo; the Hollywood “swimming musicals” of the 1930s; and delving in and out of Olympic history, Haunts of the Black Masseur is an enthralling assessment of man—body submerged, self-absorbed. It is quite simply the best celebration of swimming ever written, even as it explores aspects of culture in a heretofore unimagined way.
Download or read book Total Immersion written by Terry Laughlin and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2012-03-13 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Swim better—and enjoy every lap—with Total Immersion, a guide to improving your swimming from an expert with more than thirty years of experience in the water. Terry Laughlin, the world’s #1 authority on swimming success, has made his unique approach even easier for anyone to master. Whether you’re an accomplished swimmer or have always found swimming to be a struggle, Total Immersion will show you that it’s mindful fluid movement—not athletic ability—that will turn you into an efficient swimmer. This new edition of the bestselling Total Immersion features: -A thoughtfully choreographed series of skill drills—practiced in the mindful spirit of yoga—that can help anyone swim more enjoyably -A holistic approach to becoming one with the water and to developing a swimming style that’s always comfortable -Simple but thorough guidance on how to improve fitness and form -A complementary land-and-water program for achieving a strong and supple body at any age Based on more than thirty years of teaching, coaching, and research, Total Immersion has dramatically improved the physical and mental experience of swimming for thousands of people of all ages and abilities.
Download or read book The Night Swimmers written by Peter Rock and published by Soho Press. This book was released on 2019-03-12 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Set in the ‘90s, this lyrical autobiographical novel follows the relationship that develops between a recent college grad and a young widow during their nightly swims in Lake Michigan “[A] mosaic of uncanny photographs and rediscovered diaries, fresh correspondence between ex-lovers, meditations on childhood and parenthood, an amphibious dance between the past and the present”—Karen Russell “Swimming at night, to compare its slipperiness to that of a dream would be to ignore the work of staying afloat, the mesmerism brought on by the rhythm, the repetition of the strokes.” Beneath the surface of Lake Michigan there are vast systems: crosscutting currents, sudden drop-offs, depths of absolute darkness, shipwrecked bodies, hidden places. Peter Rock’s stunning autobiographical novel begins in the ’90s on the Door Peninsula of Wisconsin. The narrator, a recent college graduate, and a young widow, Mrs. Abel, swim together at night, making their way across miles of open water, navigating the currents and swells and carried by the rise and fall of the lake. The nature of these night swims, and of his relationship to Mrs. Abel, becomes increasingly mysterious to the narrator as the summer passes, until the night that Mrs. Abel disappears. Twenty years later, the narrator—now married with two daughters—tries to understand those months, his forgotten obsessions and dreams. Digging into old notebooks and letters, as well as clippings he’s preserved on the “psychic photography” of Ted Serios and scribbled quotations from Rilke and Chekhov, the narrator rebuilds a world he’s lost. He also looks for clues to the fate of Mrs. Abel, and begins once again to swim distances in dark water.
Download or read book Chasing Water written by Anthony Ervin and published by Akashic Books. This book was released on 2016-03-14 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Olympic swimmer reveals the wild and challenging journey that took place between two gold medals: “Inspiring, humorous, and often profound.”—People Magazine Anthony Ervin is an Olympic swimmer who won the gold at nineteen—and that may be one of the least interesting things about him. An athlete of Jewish and African-American descent who is also a practicing Buddhist, he auctioned off the medal he won in Sydney to help raise funds for victims of the 2004 tsunami. He had grown up battling Tourette’s syndrome, and later struggled with suicidal depression, drinking and drugs, and a period of homelessness. This blend of memoir and biography, written by Ervin in collaboration with trainer Constantine Markides, is part spiritual quest, part self-destructive bender involving Zen temples, fast motorcycles, tattoo parlors, and rock 'n' roll bands—revealing the journey that preceded his remarkable 2016 Olympic comeback as the oldest individual gold medal winner in swimming. Winner of the 2018 Buck Dawson Author Award presented by the International Swimming Hall of Fame “Gripping…Readers will understand the psyche and life of elite athletes as never before.”—Library Journal “A celebrated Olympian recounts how he rose to the top of his sport, crashed, and found redemption…The author never flinches at revealing his less-than-perfect past, and the humility he demonstrates at coming to terms with his own egotism and personal shortcomings makes the book frequently compelling. A provocative and refreshingly honest redemption memoir.”—Kirkus Reviews
Download or read book The Chronology of Water written by Lidia Yuknavitch and published by Hawthorne Books. This book was released on 2011-04-01 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is not your mother’s memoir. In The Chronology of Water, Lidia Yuknavitch, a lifelong swimmer and Olympic hopeful escapes her raging father and alcoholic and suicidal mother when she accepts a swimming scholarship which drug and alcohol addiction eventually cause her to lose. What follows is promiscuous sex with both men and women, some of them famous, and some of it S&M, and Lidia discovers the power of her sexuality to help her forget her pain. The forgetting doesn’t last, though, and it is her hard-earned career as a writer and a teacher, and the love of her husband and son, that ultimately create the life she needs to survive.
Download or read book Marathon Swimming The Sport of the Soul written by Paul Andrew Asmuth and published by Elm Hill. This book was released on 2019-01-08 with total page 246 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When the plans and dreams of a young swimmer are shattered by the United States’ boycott of the 1980 Olympic Games in Moscow, God opens the door of new opportunities. For Paul Asmuth, then 22, it is the end of an unfulfilled dream, and the beginning of another journey, this one remarkable and life-changing. Plunging into the astounding, grueling, hypnotic, and often oddly beautiful world of international marathon swimming competitions, Asmuth experiences both triumph and tragedy, and, in a process as long and punishing as the marathon swims themselves, slowly discovers the best of himself. If you care for resumes, Asmuth is one of the most successful marathon swimmers in history. In the sapphire seas off Italy, in the frigid lakes of Quebec, Canada, in the marshy back bays of New Jersey, in the questionable waters ringing Manhattan, swimming distances from twenty to forty miles, Asmuth emerged victorious, often to thunderous acclaim. After multiple victories at the twenty-six-mile swim across Quebec’s Lac Memphremagog, up to 20,000 spectators would cheer and call him “le roi” (the king) of their lake. But true victory is not a matter of accolades or medals, and the stories that make a real difference unfold behind the headlines. Overcoming self-doubt, nausea, hypothermia, cruel tides and dark, watery shadows both real and imagined, Asmuth calls upon passion, iron-clad resolve, and steadfast faith to emerge a changed man, attaining success in its truest and most honest form. This success does not end when Asmuth retires from competing. Coming full circle, when he hangs up his swim suit, Paul takes the knowledge, lessons and examples he learned from his own experiences and some of the world’s greatest coaches, and turns to helping others with their swimming dreams. His prayers to give back are answered by coaching opportunities at multiple World Championships and two Olympic Games, where marathon swimming is now a contested event. But this is not just the tale of a swimmer. Like any great story, Paul’s transcends sport. By listening to the voice of faith and not of fear, new dreams are born, and God’s plans are revealed.
Download or read book The Watermen written by Michael Loynd and published by Ballantine Books. This book was released on 2023-06-13 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The feel-good underdog story of the first American swimmer to win Olympic gold, set against the turbulent rebirth of the modern Games, that “bring[s] to life an inspiring figure and illuminate[s] an overlooked chapter in America’s sports history” (The Wall Street Journal) “Once or twice in a decade, one of these stories . . . like Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken [or] Daniel Brown’s The Boys in the Boat . . . captures the imagination of the public. . . . Add The Watermen by Michael Loynd to this illustrious list.”—Swimming World Winner of the International Swimming Hall of Fame’s Paragon Award and the Buck Dawson Authors Award In the early twentieth century, few Americans knew how to swim, and swimming as a competitive sport was almost unheard of. That is, until Charles Daniels took to the water. On the surface, young Charles had it all: high-society parents, a place at an exclusive New York City prep school, summer vacations in the Adirondacks. But the scrawny teenager suffered from extreme anxiety thanks to a sadistic father who mired the family in bankruptcy and scandal before abandoning Charles and his mother altogether. Charles’s only source of joy was swimming. But with no one to teach him, he struggled with technique—until he caught the eye of two immigrant coaches hell-bent on building a U.S. swim program that could rival the British Empire’s seventy-year domination of the sport. Interwoven with the story of Charles’s efforts to overcome his family’s disgrace is the compelling history of the struggle to establish the modern Olympics in an era when competitive sports were still in their infancy. When the powerful British Empire finally legitimized the Games by hosting the fourth Olympiad in 1908, Charles’s hard-fought rise climaxed in a gold-medal race where British judges prepared a trap to ensure the American upstart’s defeat. Set in the early days of a rapidly changing twentieth century, The Watermen—a term used at the time to describe men skilled in water sports—tells an engrossing story of grit, of the growth of a major new sport in which Americans would prevail, and of a young man’s determination to excel.
Download or read book Freedom Swimmer written by Wai Chim and published by Scholastic Inc.. This book was released on 2021-11-02 with total page 201 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A powerful story of friendship, bravery, and a desperate bid for freedom, inspired by true events. Ming survived the famine that killed his parents during China's "Great Leap Forward", and lives a hard but adequate life, working in the fields. When a group of city boys comes to the village as part of a Communist Party re-education program, Ming and his friends aren't sure what to make of the new arrivals. They're not used to hard labor and village life. But despite his reservations, Ming befriends a charming city boy called Li. The two couldn't be more different, but slowly they form a bond over evening swims and shared dreams. But as the bitterness of life under the Party begins to take its toll on both boys, they begin to imagine the impossible: freedom.
Download or read book Dip written by Andrew Fusek Peters and published by Random House. This book was released on 2014-05-01 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Dip, Andrew Fusek Peters describes an extraordinary year of wild swimming. He leads us to rivers, lakes, waterfalls and hidden pools, into untamed landscapes that have the potential to surprise and move us in unexpected ways. Following in the wake of great writers such as Richard Jefferies and Edward Thomas, Dip combines meditations on place, history and myth with sharp observation and a poet's eye. As he takes the plunge and immerses himself in the elements, Andrew also begins to surface from a deep depression, making Dip at once a personal journey and about the many ways in which wild water and nature can restore us to ourselves.
Download or read book Swimming to Freedom written by Kent Wong and published by Abrams. This book was released on 2021-04-27 with total page 314 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Kent Wong was a young boy, his father, a patriotic Chinese official in the customs office in Hong Kong, joined an insurrection at work and returned with the family to the newly established People’s Republic of China. Hailed as heroes, they settled in the southern city of Canton. But Mao’s China was dangerous and unstable, with landlords executed en-masse and millions dying of starvation during the Great Leap Forward.
Download or read book Find a Way written by Diana Nyad and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2016-06-28 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NOW THE NETFLIX FILM NYAD, STARRING ANNETTE BENING AND JODIE FOSTER Hillary Clinton said that Find a Way would stay with her through the general election: “When you’re facing big challenges in your life, you can think about Diana Nyad getting attacked by the lethal sting of box jellyfishes. And nearly anything else seems doable in comparison.” When Diana Nyad arrived on the shore of Key West after fifty-three hours of grueling swimming across an epic ocean, she not only set a world record—becoming the first person to swim the shark-infested waters between Cuba and Florida with no cage for protection—she also succeeded in fulfilling a dream she first chased at age twenty-eight and at long last achieved when she was sixty-four. Now, in a riveting memoir, Diana shares a spirited account of what it takes to face one’s fears, engage one’s passions, and never ever give up. For no matter what life may throw at you, or how many times you may have experienced defeat, it is always possible—as long as you commit to living life to the nth degree, no regrets—to “find a way."
Download or read book Taking the Plunge written by Anna Deacon and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The thrill of plunging--or dipping a toe--into open water brings joy, confidence, adventure, and friendship. It can wash away stress and sadness, pain and grief. Here water is a great healer, a place to feel gloriously, elementally alive and in touch with yourself, with others, and with nature. Full of life-affirming personal stories and breath-taking images of scenery and swimmers, this bookcelebrates the remarkable wild swimming community. With practical advice on how wild swimming works and how to get started--from what you'll need (a swimsuit and a smile ) to where best to go (rivers, oceans, lochs, lakes . . .)--there's never been a better time to take the plunge.
Download or read book Swimming for Freedom written by Tera Bradham and published by BroadStreet Publishing Group LLC. This book was released on 2020-06-02 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tera Bradham was born to prove people wrong. The fastest swimmer her age in the United States by age ten, many believed “Tera the Terror” was destined for the Olympics. Her fiercely competitive spirit and unmatched intensity knew no limits until Tera suffered a sudden, devastating shoulder injury that derailed her promising career. Although she trusted in God, she also wrestled with doubts of his goodness throughout subsequent years of misdiagnoses, chronic pain, and crippling disappointment. Her injury finally forced her to fully surrender to God. Then her miracle came, or so she thought. Her shoulder was successfully reconstructed, and after two more years of grueling recovery, Tera found the courage to swim again and pursue her dreams with renewed faith. Swimming for Freedom tells the story of Tera’s unconventional comeback and shows that through God, all things are possible. What started as an Olympic dream ended in her true miracle: the freedom of a life in Christ. Tera’s story will inspire you to rise up, dream again, and fight for his calling on your life.
Download or read book Godspeed written by Casey Legler and published by Atria Books. This book was released on 2019-10-15 with total page 176 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A memoir for our times.” —Michael Stipe “A coming-of-age drama captured through poetic prose and convincing honesty.” —Kirkus Reviews “I swim for every chance to get wasted—after every meet, every weekend, every travel trip. This is what I look forward to and what I tell no one: the burn of it down my throat, to my soul curled up in my lungs, the sharpest pain all over it—it seizes and stretches, becoming alive again, and is the only thing that makes sense.” At fifteen, Casey Legler is already one of the fastest swimmers in the world. She is also an alcoholic, isolated from her family, and incapable of forming lasting connections with those around her. Driven to compete at the highest levels, sent far away from home to train with the best coaches and teams, she finds herself increasingly alone and alienated, living a life of cheap hotels and chlorine-worn skin, anonymous sexual encounters and escalating drug use. Even at what should be a moment of triumph—competing at age sixteen in the 1996 Olympics—she is an outsider looking in, procuring drugs for Olympians she hardly knows, and losing her race after setting a new world record in the qualifying heats. After submitting to years of numbing training in France and the United States, Casey can see no way out of the sinister loneliness that has swelled and festered inside her. Yet wondrously, when it is almost too late, she discovers a small light within herself, and senses a point of calm within the whirlwind of her life. In searing, evocative, visceral prose, Casey gives language to loneliness in this startling story of survival, defiance, and of the embers that still burn when everything else in us goes dark.
