What’s been going on with the Race Club? Good question. Since the Olympic Trials in July I have taken time away from swimming, and a break from all things swimming related since Beijing. That means I have not been checking in on the message boards.

First I’ll let you know what’s been going on with me. It wasn’t an easy thing to do, breaking away from the habit of checking the boards a dozen or more times a day. I needed a vacation. It had been close to three years since my last vacation.

My wife Elizabeth and I toured the Pacific Northwest with our two kids. It was very nice.

Race Club Vitamins and Supplements

During the break hands have not been idle. The Race Club is producing it’s own line of vitamins and supplements.

It seems nearly every company represented in a Vitamin Shoppe or GNC is either owned by or endorsed by a body builder. Bodybuilding would be the dirtiest sport in the world, if it were a sport.

I am a biased swimmer, it’s true, but if given a choice between a body builder brand or a brand developed by a group of tested Olympic athletes I’m going with the non-body building brand. I think that a lot of other people would too.

Resources for tested athletes to find out what is okay to take, why you should be taking vitamins and supplements, and how they help you are not readily available or even wholly reliable. Unfortunately, every question that I have ever asked the anti doping agency regarding a product has been replied to with a standard “Take at your own risk” automated response.

Of all the swimmers that are taking a protein supplement how many do you think can tell the difference between a whey protein and the other kind of regular protein? Most know that protein is supposed to help with recovery but how many know exactly how it helps? What’s the difference between a very good whey protein and a not so good whey protein?

Protein is perhaps one of the most commonly used supplements among swimmers yet the lack of answers among those taking it is shocking. When newer products like Dara Torres’ amino acids (another protein) are commonly talked about where do you go to find out about it? Is it legal? Is it safe?

Rather than stand by and mope about the fact that unscrupulous athletes are cheating the Race Club has decided to get involved to offer clean athletes the best options when choosing a line of supplements that will assist you in achieving your own goals in sport.

You don’t need to be paranoid to think that there are performance-enhancing substances (plural) being abused in sport (our beloved sport of swimming too). Using legal supplements is our only way to make up some of the lost ground the cheaters have on us.

The Race Club will create an online resource for those that are interested in taking vitamins and supplements.

Today every athlete should be taking supplements. We want to offer our input, gathered from the experience of many Olympic athletes. We want to share the formulas that we have used and seen results from.

We are pleased to announce that our first original formula will be available in the coming weeks. Thunderbolt is a pre-workout/pre-competition formula. We encourage you to give it a try and tell us what you think.

The Elite Team

Mike Bottom decided to leave us for a better offer that we could not match from the University of Michigan. We wish him and the Wolverine team well. The announcement came about three weeks before Olympic Trials.

Mike’s departure left us with the problem of finding a suitable replacement for our elite program. We have now narrowed down our search to a couple of unbelievably talented coaches. We will be announcing our plans for the elite team soon.

When we resume the elite team we will be headquartered out of the University of Miami pool, a move that we are very excited about.

Your friend in swimming,
Gary Hall Jr.