Swimming World - TV

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Tiffany Elias: This is the Morning Swim Show for Wednesday, April 11th, 2012. I am your host Tiffany Elias filling in for Peter Busch and today we have a veteran in the FINIS Monitor. Joining us out from Southern California is Jessica Hardy. Jessica, thanks for joining us today.



Jessica Hardy: Thanks for having me on here again.



Tiffany Elias: All right so we have been following you the last couple of years and you seem to flip-flop back and forth between the sprint freestyle and breaststroke but after a great Grand Prix in Indiana you posted a 1:06:01 to put you on top of that world record --fastest in the world right now. So is it safe to say the sprint breaststrokes are your focus?



Jessica Hardy: No, I wouldn't say that it is just breaststroke or just freestyle, but I am very happy with that breaststroke swim in Indianapolis I definitely still train both strokes just as equally of an emphasis in both, so you know I am hoping for both of them to work out at the end of the summer.



Tiffany Elias: Well your 50 freestyle was pretty good, too " 25.0. Was that about where you wanted to be for both those events?



Jessica Hardy: Yeah. I didn't really have any expectations at all. You know swimming in-season it is not you know our focus whatsoever. It is very much training through it and seeing what you can do and getting out of your normal day-to-day routine and working on racing as you know a fun experience. I was excited to just race and didn't really have any expectations at all. I struggled a little bit on the first date of the meet but it was the first time I had worries since December at Duel in the Pool, so you know that is to be expected when you take that long of a break from racing and when I am training so hard so I think I got more into the groove as the meet went on and that is why the breaststroke was so great but I am happy with the 50 free was pretty good also.



Tiffany Elias: Now how come you had such a long break in between those two meets?



Jessica Hardy: You know it wasn't intentional. It wasn't like I didn't want to go and race but I really just wanted to focus on training. This is a really important year and my natural instincts, what I really like to do is travel all the time and race all the time but my coach you know reined me in and told me that I needed to train this year and it was definitely the right decision you know to set me up for coming in and just trying to race more now in the summer and to ultimately taper for Olympic Trials and hopefully the Olympics.



Tiffany Elias: So will you have any more meets before Trials? Are you going to do anymore of those Grand Prix's?



Jessica Hardy: Yeah, I am doing" I think I am pretty much doing a meet now every two weeks until our Olympic Trials. So we are doing Charlotte and maybe Santa Clara and there is the Fran Crippen Memorial meet in Mission Viejo and then the Irvine Grand Challenge up here in Southern California so it should be a little bit busy now, which is really exciting.



Tiffany Elias: Well since you mentioned training. You are swimming with all the right people. You"ve got Rebecca Soni over there and Yuliya Efimova, so is there any talk on the pool deck that you ladies potentially could sweep the medals out in London?



Jessica Hardy: No, we don't talk about it at all. Definitely don"t want to jinx anything and that is what is so hard to follow up I even for just to make the team, that is definitely our focus just to make it so that is what we talk about everyday but it would be really cool to have the three of us from the same club medal in the 100 breast and I think there is a good life of it that it could happen and I think it was kind of an unspoken goal but we are not fully focusing on the present right now.



Tiffany Elias: Well that would be definitely the first time any team has ever done that at the Olympics. Now training aside, you have got a lot going on over there in your personal life that we have heard about. Within the last month you had an engagement is that correct?



Jessica Hardy: Yeah I did. Yeah.



Tiffany Elias: Well congratulations. Could you share with us that story?



Jessica Hardy: He took me to Malibu at sunset, the beach is one of the great beaches here in Southern California which I think is the prettiest beach in the world at sunset and you know I am a typical girl where I didn't really you know, know what is happening so I was taken my time and running late and we almost missed the sunset and I didn't understand why it was such a big deal. But he proposed like right as the sun was going down. We were on like a private beach and he had rose petals waiting at dinner after it was really, really, really nice.



Tiffany Elias: Well that sounds like great engagement a lot of exciting things going on in 2012.



Jessica Hardy: Yeah.



Tiffany Elias: And Southern California definitely keeps you active as other surf board back behind you?



Jessica Hardy: Yeah that is my fianc" Dom's. It is his surf board over there.



Tiffany Elias: Now he is also a swimmer. Is he still training?



Jessica Hardy: Yeah, he actually qualified for his own big team a couple of weeks ago back in Switzerland. I think he is swimming the 200 free, the 400 free and maybe the 100 free also.



Tiffany Elias: So does that really help get you motivated for trials coming up to see if you guys will have that experience together?



Jessica Hardy: Sure. It has been a goal ever since we have been dating and almost did it in 2008 but this is you know I guess an exciting time that it is really cool to have him already qualified and already have that one instead of I am going to the Olympics every day around me and just kind of makes expect that of myself.



Tiffany Elias: Right. Well since you have done so well in the 100 breaststroke there has been so much talk about Soni over the past couple of years just she has done really well in the 100 and the 200. Do you feel at all like a slight underdog in this event that maybe attention"s off of you that you might be able to step up and really, really make a name for yourself again being that you are the current world record holder?



Jessica Hardy: Yeah, I guess so. She has been a favorite for the past years and I haven't even raced internationally the past two years so I am definitely not the favorite right now but you know that is totally fine with me on being the underdog "going to the Olympics" is not a bad place to be in and you know it is one of those things where as a swimmer you can kind of only control yourself and the hard work you do and swim in your own lane so I am going there to, going into the summer swim in my own lane and before I got myself, I am doing the best that I can do and hopefully something good will happen.



Tiffany Elias: Well and I think that is the right attitude to have. Now the last time you were on the show you actually weren't sure if you had been cleared for the 2012 Olympics. Now when you found out you were able to go ahead and swim and compete what was that feeling and what have these games mean to you after everything you have been through over the past couple of years?



Jessica Hardy: Shoot, that is a loaded question. You know it took forever for me to find out that I can even go to the Olympics so I would be in team meetings with a national team or my coach and you know they have been talking about the ultimate goal was London. London this, London that, and it would it would cause a knot in my stomach every time they said it you know because I had no clue if I could go and it was so hard mentally to just keep training and keep competing with no real end goal. Like I didn't I couldn't focus on anything further than when I was doing now and to have gotten the okay to continue on and then given the chance to compete this summer is so, so amazing you know, being forced to sit out and doing my suspension out of competition and training you know just being like a bird locked in a cage where I literally could not wait to get out. And now that I get to go to the Olympics and try to live my dreams again, it is such an exciting and meaningful thing for me now and I can't believe how much I took it for granted before you know I broke overall record at my first international meet ever and been on the national team on this every year -- every year except in my suspension since then and I took it for granted for sure because I just thought that is what I did all the time. It just came easy, but now having out there what I have been through it is so meaningful and I am so appreciative of this whole journey and this whole process leading up to this summer.



Tiffany Elias: Well Jessica you are the epitome of perseverance and you have really proven to be an inspiration to all the swimmers out there so way to stick with it and we are pulling for you over here. We know you are going to do some great things in the upcoming months.



Jessica Hardy: Thank you very much. I appreciate it.



Tiffany Elias: All right well thanks for joining us again on the Morning Swim Show.



Jessica Hardy: No problem. Thanks for having me. We"ll see you later.



Tiffany Elias: That is it for today's Morning Swim Show. I am your host Tiffany Elias and join us again tomorrow.