Erik Vendt, 1500m specialist, has a blog

He also "owned" Michael Phelps in the 1500m free last weekend at the Eric Namesnik Memorial Gran Prix. Though the 1500m free is not Michael Phelps' event, Erik Vendt used just 3 seconds to remind him. Vendt: 15:31.29 - Phelps: 15 34.18.


Erik has a blog and a photo gallery. Here is a link to his blog: [Link]

Team Tyr: Erik Hochstein and Dan Wegner: first and second in the 500 free!

1 Hochstein, Erik 38 TYR - 4:43.17

r:+0.93 25.99 53.88 (27.89)
1:22.21 (28.33) 1:50.77 (28.56)
2:19.33 (28.56) 2:48.17 (28.84)
3:16.52 (28.35) 3:44.70 (28.18)
4:13.72 (29.02) 4:43.17 (29.45)

2 Wegner, Dan 35 TYR - 4:50.00

r:+0.89 25.40 53.27 (27.87)
1:21.86 (28.59) 1:50.82 (28.96)
2:20.27 (29.45) 2:50.14 (29.87)
3:20.41 (30.27) 3:50.87 (30.46)
4:21.15 (30.28) 4:50.00 (28.85)

#45 Men 500 Free

Team TYR Swimmer Erik Hochstein places 2nd in the 100 fly

2007 USMS Short Course Yards Championships: The 100 fly is not Erik's event; he usually swims the 200 free as his specialty, so I missed that he swam in it this morning and placed second. 52.62 - split times 24.59 - 28.03

2007 USMS Short Course Yards Championships started today!

The USMS short course Nationals began and I will be watching out for Joel of the The 17th man blog and Team TYR. Click on the following links for the results:

#1 Men 1000 Free
#2 Women 1000 Free
#3 Men 1650 Free
#4 Women 1650 Free

What a meet: Team Tyr stormed 2 national records and SCAQ did great!

UCLA Bruin Masters Meet short recap: Team TYR; (this blogs favorite brand), set two National records in both the 400-yard freestyle relay and the 800-yard freestyle relay. After I filmed the 400 relay, I turned to a girl with strawberry-blond hair sitting behind me and I ask if they broke the record, she relied, "Yes, by 8 seconds." I am deaf in my left ear so I asked her to repeat it and she said, "8 seconds." When your deaf you get yelled in an exasperated fashion if you ask people to repeat something too many times so I cheerfully acknowledged and walked away thinking I must have heard one-eighth-of-a-second since 8 seconds is HUGE!

When I bumped into Dan Leonard I asked him if they broke the record by an eighth-of-a-second, he said, "No!, it was 8 seconds." ...That's HUGE!

Michael Phelps, Amanda Beard, and Ian Crocker are signed with Team "Speedo." However, Michael Phelps swims in Michigan, Amanda Beard at USC, and Ian Crocker in Texas with Eddie Reese. There is no Team Speedo pool where they all get Speedo coaching and swim inside Speedo water. The same goes with Team TYR.

I can say with certainty that these Team TYR members: Dan, Erik, and Scott, swim, and/or coach at my swimming club, Southern California Aquatics. I appreciate their accomplishments, their advice and it was thrilling watching them do it.

I didn't get to meet "the 17th man" but I did see his 100 fly time and his 100 fly beat my 100 free time by a second. Go look at his blog for details including his insane workouts. Support swim blogs by visiting their sponsors too.

My personal times were slow today, I blame it on a lousy warm-up and a couple of silly mistakes. I still had fun though.

A UCLA Bruin Masters Meet movie is coming!!!

The SPMA Regionals video with Team SCAQ is coming along nicely!

It seems like for every minute of footage I shoot I seem to spend an hour-and-a-half or so on obsessing about each minute of the final presentation. I have learned a lot about filming swimming from this video; you either want to be filming the race from under water or from about six-feet above the water while at a 3/4 viewpoint.

Additionally, use as many cameras as possible and film everything. It turns out that the even the most boring things can be the most interesting things to watch. Like a swimmer putting on their goggles or viewing a pleasant conversation you can't hear.

Obviously a tripod is vital but; like a snail-brain, I didn't use the one had despite having brought it! Nonetheless, this video is really going to be a lot of fun to watch and I am having a lot of fun making it.