Athlete of the Week: Katelyn Sauder

Alexandra Marable, Editor in Chief • Nov 27, 2013

Pantagraph

Katelyn Sauder(11) has been swimming since the age of eight; a member of the varsity swim team all three years of her high school career. Sauder is a member of Waves, a year round swim team, which she takes time off from to swim the high school season coached by Heather Budak.

Sauder has had an outstanding season thus far and could not be happier with how the season has gone. She has continuously lowered the 100-yard breaststroke record, which previously stood at 1:08.76, throughout the season.

At Sectionals on November 16^th, Sauder qualified for State in the 100-yard breaststroke and helped the 200-yard medley relay and 200-yard freestyle relay teams advance as well.

During preliminaries on November 22^nd, Sauder swam her best time of 1:04.47 and made it to finals. But she did end up adding a bit of time.

“Little did I know I was getting the flu and would get sick about 4 hours later,” Sauder said in regards to her performance in finals. She still managed to place 12^th in finals.

“I was very happy with both of my performances! I got the Pantagraph area record at Sectionals, and then at State I made finals, which was my ultimate goal of the season.”

Sauder had been doing a lot outside of the high school season to prepare for this high school season. After last year’s high school season ended, she trained at Waves six days a week between two and two and a half hours.

During the summer, her attendance at practice increased. She had doubles five days a week and a three-hour practice on Saturdays. Athletes refer to days when they have two practices a day as doubles. Sauder also began seeing a trainer twice a week for weight lifting and additional conditioning. She said, “I made my stroke better by having stronger starts, turns, and underwaters [kick-outs].”

Sauder receives a lot of help and support from teammates and coaches. She mentioned that her teammates make high school swimming enjoyable and that they all share a great bond. Sauder also mentioned that her coaches give her the tools to succeed.

Sauder stated, “Without coaches like Budak, who push me and challenge me everyday. I would not be the swimmer I am today.”

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About the Contributor

Alexandra Marable, Editor in Chief

Alexandra Marable is a senior at Normal Community High School. She has been involved with the paper for two years now. Last year, she was the Associate Editor for the paper as well as the Desk Editor for Sports. This year, she is the Editor in Chief of the Inkspot. Alexandra is also a member of the female a capella group, Cloud 9. Random Fact A random fact about myself is that I have had two surgeries on my right shoulder. They were both for the same injury. In between those surgeries, I had a labrum tear. This ongoing injury has caused me to quit swimming and turn my focus to my music and writing. Slogan to Live By A slogan that I live by is, “ You can’t put a limit on anything. The more you dream, the farther you get,” which is said by Michael Phelps. I believe that any dream can come true, you just have to work on it and you can achieve it. Biggest Pet Peeve My biggest pet peeve is when teachers walk around during tests. It tends to make my anxiety go up and then I don't focus on the test and focus on the teacher walking around instead. I wish they could just trust that students wouldn't cheat.