Nicol earns trip to second Pan Am Games

By Lethbridge Herald on April 12, 2023.

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTO Rachel Nicol of Canada swims in her heat of the women’s 50m breaststroke during the world swimming short course championships in Melbourne, Australia in December 2022. Nicol earned a spot on the national team at what will be her second Pan Am Games after a successful Canadian Swimming Trials earlier this month.

By Justin Seward

Lethbridge Herald

Lethbridge swimmer Rachel Nicol is heading to her second Pan Am (Pan American) Games after being named to the Canadian national team last week.

The Pan Am Games sees thousands of athletes  from the Americas compete in multisport competitions.

Nicol qualified for the Games based on her performances at the Canadian Swimming Trials in Toronto earlier this month.

Her  times of 1.08.08 in the 100-metre breaststroke and 31.14 in the 50-metre breaststroke at the Trials earned her spot on the national team.

Both times were good enough to earn Nicol silver medals.

“Probably relief is one of the first emotions that come when being selected for any team,” said Nicol.

“And the way the selection works for this, we had to wait a few days before we found out because it was based on a trial meet (to see) if we made the team or not. So waiting in suspense for a few days. So it’s nice to just get that confirmation that all is well and you’re on the way and just really happy. I’ve been swimming for a long time now and the first senior national team that I ever made was the Pan Am Games in 2015 in Toronto.”

Nicol said it feels really full circle coming back to kind of where it all started.

She felt her swims at the trials were OK.

“It was a pretty up and down sort of swim meet at the Trials meet,” said Nicol.

“I’ve changed by training in the past two years. So we’re just trying to try different things and experiment a little bit, and I’m really open to that right now just because I’ve been training the same way for a very long time.”

Nicol remembers everything being new, fresh and exciting with her first team at the Pan Am Games.

“At this point in time, you know eight years later, I have more baggage so to speak with swimming and the sport, and picking up injuries, and having failures and all kinds of things like that,” said Nicol.

“And so this time, I think I’ll just try to approach this in a similar way, as it being like yes I’ve gone through a lot since 2015. But like I’m kind of in the twilight of my career. So I really want to make sure that I go there with the same excitement, and enthusiasm and gratefulness to be there. And quite a few of my teammates are also on the team, so just really enjoy having them there as well and that I’m not the new person on the team this time — like I know lots of the people and that’ll be a lot of fun.”

Nicol took a week off after Trials were completed on April 2 and got back in the pool on Tuesday, but she still needs to meet with her coach to determine a training regime going forward.

“Because having that event in October is a bit of a strange time to be having that event and I’ve never had to swim a long course meet in October and like at such a high level,” he said.

“It will be interesting to see what our plan is and it’ll be a back and forth with my coach and myself, because … it’s a long season and you don’t want to burn out, right. It’s mainly making sure that we don’t bite off more than we can chew. Yes, we’re excited, but want to make sure that we put some breaks in there and not get nervous about that or feel anxious about having breaks. It’s OK to have breaks.”

There will be 36 swimmers, male and female, that will be representing Canada at the Games this fall.

The Pan Am Games are Oct. 21-25 in Santiago, Chile.