Pan Ams: Soldier Through

My bags are packed and the majority of the team is headed out to enjoy their last night in Rio de Janeiro. Most were able to see Christ the Redeemer today while the few of us that still have to swim sat behind hoping to close this meet on a good note.

About 64% of the men's team swam a lifetime best at these Pan Am Games. About 86% of the women's team swam lifetime bests. That's impressive.

Count me among those that came up a little short. It stings. The realization that I wasn't going to be swimming at the level I wanted was there before the first gun went off but the hope that things might go better than I expected lingered.

What do you say to a swimmer that just encountered some pretty serious disappointment?

Coaches and teammates have this to deal with often.

I remember (Here I go reminiscing again. I'm starting to sound like my grandfather.) sitting in the hot tub off of the warm down pool in Sydney in 2000. Jenny Thompson was devastated. She hadn't won the individual gold medal that the media had made such a big deal about. She felt like a failure. I put my arm around her.

Jenny has 12 Olympic medals. Her performance on the relays over the years earned many other swimmers gold medals. There are quite a few Olympic gold medalists out there because of Jenny. Her best efforts were for the relays.

Some media angle about how her relay medals didn't stack up to an individual gold medal had taken this negative spin instead of the really amazing thing it was. Anyone that knows Jenny knows how selfless she is. As far back as I can remember she was always a team captain for this same reason.

Her medal count is impressive. What is more impressive though is that it demonstrates that Jenny was the greatest teammate you could have.

Anyway, she was sitting there feeling like a failure. I made a feeble attempt to articulate how much respect she had from the team and from myself, that the media had missed something incredible by micro-focusing on something stupid.

It's important to realize that there are going to be setbacks. If we all went personal best times every time, there would be no joy in it, no challenge.

There is a bright side to every situation. Things can ALWAYS be worse. The bright side to not swimming well at the Pan American games is that it isn't Olympic Trials.

There is winning and there is losing but the only real failure is to fail to learn from our losses. You learn more from the races you don't win than the ones you do.

I have to go to sleep pretty soon because I do have to swim one last 50 free tomorrow before leaving straight for the airport so I'll end with another "I remember" story. In 1995 the Pan Am's were in Mar del Plata, Argentina.

After having completed my warm up I put on my sweats and was talking with teammates and a cute girl from Argentina. I lost track of time and before I knew it I was being called to the ready room. I collected my cap and goggles and went in. I put on my cap and goggles and they walked us out to the starting blocks for the 100 meter freestyle.

They announced the finalists behind their blocks and after they announced my name I did a little wave to the crowd and then turned. I took off my jacket and then my pants. I wasn't wearing a suit.

How could I have forgotten my bathing suit? I turned white. "I don't have my suit!" I was totally panicked. Fortunately, the US team was sitting near and out of the crowd this tiny Speedo comes floating down to me. Mark Henderson had shot it like a rubber band.

By this time all the other swimmers were on the blocks and looking at me as I am hopping around doing the world's fastest deck change on international television.

How could I have forgotten my suit!

My heart rate was close to 200 beats per minute as I jumped up on the blocks. I led at the 50 by about three body lengths and finished, barely, in sixth place.

What I learned from the 1995 Pan American games was not to forget your bathing suit.

What I take away from these Pan American games is not as clear to me yet. But I'll have plenty of time to figure it out.

At the tender age of 32, I am still learning and learning is what makes us better.

Off to soldier through tomorrow's 50 free,

Gary Hall Jr.