Winning has become habitual for the DePauw men's swimming and diving team. Three consecutive victories have come handily, with multiple spots on the squad shining.
During that span, the team has routed their opponents by an average of nearly 75 points. Although the Tigers are hoping to keep up their victorious spell, they intend to dice things up a bit.
The Tigers travel to Crawfordsville for the Patrick Woehnker Invitational this weekend for the last in-season meet. Afterwards, they'll begin tapering, slowly but surely, as they decrease yardage, to get ready for the Dec. 5-7 showing at Kenyon College.
Coach Adam Cohen believes that this is a great time to keep things in perspective. Coaches will now look more analytically at each swimmer. Essentially, athletes are fighting for their starting spots.
"This weekend will be a great checkpoint to make sure we are ready for the Kenyon invite," senior Jack Burgeson said. "The team has trained harder up until this point than any other year that I have been at DePauw."
In order to test their progression, the Tigers will take on competition from all three NCAA division levels, including the University of Indianapolis, who is ranked eighth in Division II. DePauw aims to ensure that they are well suited and in doing so, will highlight their relays.
The program has had a rich history of nationally-ranked relays. This season seems to be no different, as many relays have remained on par. At the last meet against Wabash College, two DePauw relays took first. Sophomore Blake Lehmann, junior Casey Hooker and seniors Burgeson and Matt Haeske won the 200 medley relay in 1:34:31. The 400 free relay of junior Alex Alfonso, Hooker, Burgeson and Lehmann won in 3:10:97.
The women's squad is coming up after a week off of competition. This invite offers an opportunity for the bunch to get back in action as they also prepare for Kenyon. Their last bit of competition dates back to Nov. 8, when the Tigers ousted Wittenberg University by 48 points.
For some, this serves as the first full collegiate invite, which gives more leverage for coaches to delegate spots more liberally. This may directly impact the first-years itching for a variation.
"I'm excited to mix it up because I traditionally only swim sprint freestyle," first-year Elly Gleason said. "The team is in good spirits and is very excited."
The Tigers are hoping that both their recent succeses and obvious confidence continues on through their tapering. In this instance, while yardage goes down, intensity still may pick back up.
This is executed through modified workouts with a focus on regulating results. However, this is only a portion of the training schedule looming over the rest of the season. After this stretch, the team will make way to Florida in December to pick back up training intensity across the board. Until then, the Tigers are taking training one meet at a time.
"I think we will be able to fine-tune our races to perfect them before the big meet," Burgeson said. "I am confident that our hard work will pay off and we will have some great tapered times."