Wright 1

Jackson Wright

Ms. Reed

English 9

12 February 2020

All or Nothing

It was at that swim meet in which I learned you have to give something your all if you

want to succeed, and if you give anything less, you will lose.

We were at a swim meet for the Galloway swim team, where we had warmed up and

were now waiting for the meet to start. After we saluted the flag, we had to wait another twenty

minutes before our first event was up.

As we walked to the block, we passed all the other teams, whose teams were much bigger

than ours since we were a team of only ten.

Once we had arrived at the block, we waited for each other to swim since we are all in

different heats, which are the different levels of skill in an event. The higher the heat you are in,

the faster you are and the faster the people are that you are racing against. Ethan and Harry, two

of my friends, had heats that were below me, so I waited with them in their lanes and watched

them swim.

Ethan got third and Harry around fifth place.

“Great job,” I said as they got out of the water, “you got third and you did well too

Harry.”

They both said, “Thanks.” And as I walked to my lane to swim, they both said, “Good

luck, Jackson.”
 Wright 2

I finally made it to my lane and waited. I then looked around to see what the competition

would be like and all I saw were people who were older, bigger, and more muscular than me. I

thought that I would most likely not get in the top three and maybe not even the top five.

As I was thinking this, the long, shrill whistle, telling swimmers to step up on the block,

pierced my thoughts. Hurriedly, I got on the block and waited for the signal of three short

whistles that would tell us to get ready.

Once the three short whistles had been blown, I put myself in the position to dive off the

block, in which my butt is up and my head and chest are down. Then the wait began for the long

whistle that would tell us to dive and swim for it. It seemed like an eternity, but finally, it came

and the second I heard it, I was gone.

I jumped, pointed myself like an arrow, and I hit the water at an angle that would make it

so I didn’t dive too deep, but also where I wouldn’t belly flop. As I was submerged in water it

shocked me how cold it was, but I pushed past it, glided through the water and made it to the

surface, where I started to move my arms in the motion for freestyle, to propel me forward. I was

kicking, but barely. You see, I hate kicking while swimming, it is just weird and I am already

pretty fast if I use only my arms.

I soon neared the end of the pool, where I would do my flip turn. I started to calculate in

my head the distance to the wall while I was still swimming towards it. I had to get this perfect if

I didn’t want to come in last place. I reached, flipped, and then pushed off the wall as hard as I

could. I had nailed that flip-turn. I began swimming again.

I had no idea where I was at in the race, so I did a quick glance to the side and saw that

another kid was just a bit ahead of me.

 Wright 3

It was at that moment that I knew I would have to give a hundred percent if I wanted to

win. I would need to use my legs. So I began to pump my legs up and down in the water as hard

as I could, turning the water white with bubbles, while still going just as fast with my arms.

I was going faster now. So much faster. The end of the race was near, for I was only ten

feet from the wall. I pushed myself even further and before I knew it I was slamming my hand

against the pad on the wall that would determine my place in the race.

I began to tread water and catch my breath. Once I finally had enough oxygen, I turned

around, looked at the board, and smiled as I could now see that I had gotten first place.

Now that I had seen my score, I pulled myself out of the water and started walked over to

my team which sadly was on the other side of the room, so I was so cold since I had just been

swimming and now the air was hitting my wet body.

When I got to my team, I got high-fives and heard my friends say, “Good Job.”

My coach then came over and said, “Jackson, if you swim and push yourself like that,

you’ll be getting state times soon.”

For the rest of the night, I got only one more first place. However, I was the only one

swimming in that heat.