Hess leaves Pronghorns swimming for High Performance Centre

By Lethbridge Herald on August 24, 2023.

Herald FILE PHOTO The Horns’ Apollo Hess carves the water to a gold medal during the 200-meter breaststroke at the Canada West Championship on Sunday in this November 2022 file photo. Hess swam his way on to the Canadian Olympic team.

By Justin Seward

Lethbridge Herald

Now former University of Lethbridge Pronghorns  men’s swimming phenom and local product Apollo Hess has left the institution to take on a new opportunity in the sport.

Beginning next week, Hess will open a new chapter in swimming at Toronto’s High Performance Centre.

The focus of these high performance entities is to help develop identified swimmers  and in doing so reaching their full potential with the assistance of trained coaches on staff to address their needs.

HPC wants swimmers to get to a point where they are developing a training and competition environment to give them an opportunity to win at the highest level.

Swimmers are entitled to support services such as sport science, medical support and have access to top  Canadian academic institutions.

“So I was invited to join the High Performance Centre in Ontario under head coach Ryan Mallette,” said Hess.

“I’m pretty excited to go there. I think it’s a good step in my swimming career and I think I’ll be able to accomplish some pretty good things.”

Hess was looking for a change in terms of atmosphere and training.

“Last year, around this time, I was a little bit curious, and I was kind of exploring some options before eventually rejoining the Horns,” said Hess.

“But I took a week in Toronto and I spent that time training with the High Performance Centre group and I really liked it there. And yeah it’s a great facility, and great coaching staff and great people to train with. So I kind of like wanted to go there all of last year but I was in classes and couldn’t just drop them. I kind of just like (stuck) it out for the rest of the year and kind of just waited for now to leave I guess.”

What intrigued Hess about the HPC was being surrounded by Olympians and not having the school stresses.

“And so, just being surrounded by those people, I think like day in and day out would be like huge for me,” said Hess.

“I think not having the stress of school always in the back of my mind while I’m training, I think that’ll make a huge difference. Here it was nice. I was able to train at home and live at home. But it was pretty stressful to say the least with all the classes and exams on top of like (a) pretty intense swimming schedule. So I think clearing up like part of my schedule and yeah like destressing my life a little bit will make a huge difference.”

Hess’s ultimate goal is to make the Olympics.

“I’m pretty confident I can make the Olympic team if go I there and that’s mostly the reason that I am,” said Hess.

He doesn’t think his time as a Pronghorn is quite over yet.

“I would like to explore the possibility of coming back at some point,” he said.

“But yeah it’s definitely tough for now because two of my closest buddies, Raine Arden and Chris Alexander, this is their last year of eligibility. And so, those two are on my relays all the time, and so if I do come back next year, they won’t be around, so that’s a little bit of tough pill to swallow. But once again I think at the end of the day, I just have to do what’s best for me.”

He has put a pause on his school eligibility for right now.

He will competing in the US, Canada and Europe with HPC.