My Interview with Olympian John Naber: 3 Things I Learned
I greatly enjoyed Olympic Interview #1 with John Naber. I spoke with John for an hour and even though I had known a great deal about his story for decades I learned a few new things:
His Greatest Athletic Moment: Marching into the Olympic Stadium with Team USA
Contrary to what I had expected, John’s greatest moment had nothing to do with winning swimming races or gold medals. As America’s most decorated athlete in the 1976 Games I would have thought he would say it was winning one of those four gold medal events. Or perhaps it was winning 4 consecutive NCAA team titles at USC, or beating his long-time hero and rival: Roland Mathes of the DDR (East Germany).
His greatest moment, in fact, was marching into the Olympic Stadium in Montreal in 1976 with his USA teammates. And as an athlete turned commentator who has interviewed many other Olympic athletes, John would say many other Olympians feel the same way.
Being a part of a group of people who have each trained and sacrificed so much for so many years and then being chosen to represent your country on a global stage is a big deal.
And celebrating that moment, marching with Team USA and dressed in his national uniform into a stadium of over 70,000 spectators (and a television audience of millions) was John’s greatest athletic moment.
Swim Goggles were not in use until The 1972 Olympic Trials
Per my research after the interview, I was shocked to learn it wasn’t until the early 1970s when swim goggles first made an appearance in competitive swimming. Scottish swimmer David Wilkie went down in history as the first swimmer to don a pair in a race when he competed at the 1970 Commonwealth Games, wearing a pair of homemade goggles to protect him from a chlorine allergy.
It’s hard to imagine for anyone who has trained with goggles in competitive swimming that no one used goggles before the 1972 trials.
As a club swimmer for four years I was asked to train twice a day, five days a week and at least once on the weekend. We spent a minimum three hours a day in chlorinated pools---with goggles. And even then everyone still suffered from bloodshot eyes that watered and burned at the end of the day as you ate your dinner, did homework, etc., Goggles mitigated the effects of chlorine—they did not prevent them. I cannot imagine training with no goggles!
Goggles would also be a game changer when it came to depth perception and seeing the wall more clearly, improving flip turns, seeing your competitors, etc.,
John Naber went from being a beginner swimmer as a high school freshman to barely missing the 1972 Olympics as a high school senior
John stated that his family moved to California by his ninth grade of high school and it was then he would take up swimming. He actually was closing in on Olympic trial times by his junior year but a freak injury would delay his progress until senior year. He would make the trials and barely miss a spot on the 1972 team in the 100 meter backstroke by .06 seconds.
All in four years!