I know it’s appeared that our posts reppin’ for Austin Staab have disappeared. We can explain!

See, what had happened was…

#1. He completely fell off our radar last Spring/Summer after NCAAs. And, to our knowledge, did not compete at the Olympic Trials.

#2. Our West Coast Correspondent left the Bay Area, in favor of SoCal, and no longer can make a short 20 minute trip to Stanford to check in on young Austin.

I’m from his hometown, but it’s not like he competes for WAC anymore. So, our bad!

Anyway….this post is to congratulate Austin on that bad ass 100y Fly he swam Friday at the Pac-10 Championships. He turned in a 44.69 to establish not only a new Pac-10 and Stanford Record, but also American Record that previously belonged to teh Crockah. You may now refer to Sir Staab as ‘American Record Holder Austin Staab’. Bad. Ass.

It does have a nice ring to it, doesn’t it?

So, now that I think about it, this should have been the post that had the title “The Return of ___”, but since that one’s already taken by the previous post, and it’d be terribly tacky to repeat a post title like that, I had to switch things up!

After Trials, which brought an extreme wave of sadness to the Swim Aids when Davis Tarwater didn’t make the team, we thought we’d seen the last of him in the pool. That night in Omaha, there were tears, or maybe “man tears” would be a more accurate description. Point is, we were devastated.

Our sources didn’t know any more than we did about the future of his swimming career, so we thought it was a past tense thing. To make matters worse, we knew that there were only 2 post-grad swimmers training in Ann Arbor, and both of their last names are Vanderkaay. So T-Dub!! had to be done, right?

WRONG!

Last week, I took a quick look over the Austin Grand Prix psych sheet and I saw something that made my jaw drop:

So, apparently after the quadrennium came to a close, T-Dub!! said to himself: “Take me to another place. Take me to another land.” And the Lord guided him (back) to Tennessee and the local Tennessee Aquatics swim program.

Davis is competing this weekend, in Austin, and is already off to a great start. He turned in the fastest time in the men’s 100y Fly prelims this morning.

So, can I get a “T-DUB!!” or what?

This post is brought to you by Arrested Development (the group, not the TV show, you damn young’uns):

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Well, kind of. But we’re starving for material around here, so just deal, mmk?

The Big Ten Network aired the 2009 Women’s Big Ten Swimming & Diving Championships over the weekend. Naturally I tuned in, because it isn’t every day that swimming appears on TV. I’ll take what I can get, yo.

I only caught the last 15 minutes of the initial airing and immediately recognized a familiar voice. It belonged to Miss Kaitlin Sandeno! I’m glad she’s up in the booth using her knowledge, experience, and awesome personality to call and analyze races. It’s a breath of fresh air!

And yes, she did a great job. I hope she does more events, but only if she also gets some TV hosting gigs. This girl needs to be on TV, in front of a camera. We, the tv viewing public, are being cheated every day that Kaitlin isn’t on TV. Someone please stop the torture!

I took video of the final event of the Big Ten quad-meet over the weekend; the 200y Free Relay. Michigan’s ‘A’ squad — comprised of captains Jamie Martone and Matt Patton as well as Chris Brady and Charlie Houchin — took first in 1:19.41. Second place was claimed by Ohio State’s ‘A’ team while 3rd went to Penn State.

Watch the video below:

I’m enjoying my jailbroken iPhone entirely too much!

And I do have a small sampling of photos that I will eventually share here. I would have put this on MGoSwim, but the powers that be at RegFly, saw fit to charge my card for the domain renewal and then take the domain away from me. Bastards…

During the fall, while we were all checked into rehab with Olympic Games withdrawal, we missed a pretty big event: the release of Ryk Neethling’s autobiography, Chasing the Dream.

We can hardly believe it! We were so pumped for it because we love us some Ryk; or “the hotness”, as we like to call him. Anyway, Carrie brought it up the other day and I was like “OMG, I FORGOT ABOUT HIS BOOK”! I then sat in a corner, with a dunce cap on, for a few hours.

When I was finished punishing myself, I suggested one of us buy the book and we all share it. Since the economy’s in the crapper, this is a good way to save money! Carrie had an Amazon.com gift card, so she volunteered. And when she’s done, she’s going to mail the book to me to read. Yes, I’m actually going to read a book. Go ahead and alert the media.

When I’m done reading (which could take a while, since I’m out of practice), I’m going to ship it over to kiwi. Erika has yet to inform us if she wants to read this, but she doesn’t really get a say. This is required Swim Aid reading, so she has to, or I will fly down to Houston and punch her in the face. I kid. I love her. I don’t punch people I love. Well, not on purpose anyway.

So, our question to you, the Swim Aid visitor is: have you ready Ryk’s book? Did you like it? Are there pictures of him in it? Just kidding on that last question… kind of.

Yes, I titled this “Bong Gate”. Big whoop, wanna fight about it? I also want to reiterate that we won’t be talking about it that much around here. We tend to keep things positive and light, but when the face of swimming worldwide puts the sport in the news for the wrong reasons, we just aren’t going to sit back and pretend it didn’t happen.

So, consider this post an “acknowledgment”. We don’t aim to pile on. Nothing productive will come of that.

I figured watching my usual ESPN shows today would be a little different. I was right.

First Take was the first thing I saw, upon my first visit of the day to ESPN.com.

My other usual TV viewing included Jim Rome Is Burning, Around The Horn, PTI, and celebrity entertainment shows like Extra and Access Hollywood. My brother even told me that Jay Leno made the topic part of his opening monologue.

It was interesting to see how different media outlets saw the situation and what they thought would happen. I got the impression that the celeb news magazines/shows didn’t think the situation was a big deal. The ESPN personalities and shows, which cover sports 24/7, thought it was a much bigger deal that should have far-reaching consequences. It’ll probably be somewhere in the middle, but I guess we’ll see.

Speedo and Omega will continue to support MP. Wonder who else will or won’t. Is ‘Sponsor Watch 2009′ on? Don’t ask me how I come up with these titles. And yes, I realize that I watch too much TV.

However this situation comes out, don’t expect us to put much emphasis on it on Swim Aids. We’re a goofy lot, and this was a major buzzkill to the Swim Aid mojo; which we’ve been trying to revive lately.

P.S. 10 Cool points to whomever can point out the Family Guy reference I used in this post.

Look!  Another post?  It’s like Christmas all over again, eh?

Not much news has been going on in the swimming world, as you may know. But we Swim Aids can still find stuff to blab about! It’s a gift.

Well, this isn’t a “swimming update” post per se. It’s more like a shout out. A shout out to the current reigning Miss South Dakota. “Why?” you ask. I give you three reasons:

• She’s an accomplished swimmer, holding numerous titles

• She goes to the same school I do, South Dakota State University (I was gonna say SDSU, but let’s not confuse my SD with Kiwi’s SD)

• And well, because we can!

Recently, Alexandra represented South Dakota in Las Vegas, placing in the top fifteen in the Miss America competition. She’s the first person in sixteen years to win Miss SDSU and Miss South Dakota! Girl’s breaking records in AND out of the pool.

So let me introduce you to Miss South Dakota, Alexandra Hoffman:

Height: 6′2
From: Eureka, South Dakota
Trains: During season, about 7,000-10,000 yards/day
Birth date: November 10, 1987
Club:  Eureka Area Swim Team
High School: Eureka High School
College: South Dakota State University
Platform: Don’t Risk It: Keep Sports Healthy
But wait, there’s more! »