Junior swimmer Allison Wine has a busy schedule that doesn’t look quite like any other UCLA student-athlete’s.
Wine attends swim practice every day in the same way that the rest of her team does, competing at meets and cheering loudly for her peers. She goes to lecture with the same consistency, furrowing her brow at the board from time to time.
On the weekends, however, when other Bruins her age might be either partying or cramming depending on what week it is, Wine goes home to her husband and now 2-year-old son.
Wine gave birth on Feb. 26, 2013, a development that she said was “not at all” planned.
“I was a thousand different feelings at once,” Wine said. “I was scared, excited … I don’t know, I just had probably every emotion you could have.”
When she realized that she was pregnant, she and Mark Wine had been dating for about eight months. However, Allison Wine said that she knew she was in love after just two weeks.
“I (always) knew I would marry him – we just didn’t know when,” she said. “And then obviously we had a kid.”
Wine laughed while recalling that her husband had been her strength and conditioning coach on the Terrapins Swim Team during high school, a period during which she hadn’t seen him as a potential romantic interest.
Allison and Mark Wine started dating when she left Concord to come to UCLA. They were in a long-distance relationship for her entire freshman year, and during the 2012-2013 academic year, she left Southern California and went back to her home in Northern California to give birth to her son Dominic.
“I thought it was very brave of her to give up everything – a full scholarship, (her) college life, for what she believed in,” said coach Cyndi Gallagher.
During that time she attended Diablo Valley College, working nonstop on projects and other class assignments right up until her due date.
“I was going to school, due in two weeks and giving speeches and all that,” Wine said.
After her son was born, Wine had even less leisure time, as she would stay up all hours of the night doing schoolwork. Dominic would wake up every two hours crying to be fed.
Following these late nights, Wine would get up early in the mornings, drop her son off at daycare, then drive an hour to school – not the stereotypical student habit of rolling out of bed.
Despite how natural it may have felt to simply let this routine continue, however, Wine’s husband urged her to go back to UCLA. It meant becoming a single dad on most days, not to mention being in a long-distance relationship once again.
“He’s always my number one supporter in anything,” Wine said. “He sacrifices a lot for me.”
Mark Wine, who owns Functional Muscle Fitness LCC in Concord, now stays home from work on Mondays to look after Dominic for the day.
Allison Wine’s teammates, parents and in-laws have shown their support for her young family as well.
On Fridays and on the days that Dominic goes to daycare, Wine’s parents or in-laws will pick their grandson up and watch him until Wine’s husband comes home from work.
UCLA swim and dive has also accommodated to allow Wine to be both a Bruin and a mother. On weekends when the team is not competing, Wine is allowed to miss scheduled practice and go home.
“My teammates are awesome,” Wine said. “When I go home on the weekends and I’m not at practice, they understand. They’re always asking ‘So when do you get to go home next,’ and things like that.”
Senior Jessica Khojasteh said Wine is one of the more laid-back and responsible athletes on the team.
“She’s very strong and independent, and I think if anyone could do what she’s doing, it would be her,” Khojasteh said.
For Wine, missing practice doesn’t seem to take a toll on performance at all: She recently broke the school record for the 100-yard breaststroke at the USC dual meet, and then broke it again during the Pac-12s.
“She’s the best breaststroker we’ve ever had,” Gallagher said.
But however thinly Wine tries to spread herself between Northern and Southern California, it is impossible to be in two places at once.
“It’s really hard to leave (Dominic) every week,” Wine said. “You feel like you’re not there, and people have to tell you about things he did. You feel like you’re not there for your child’s upbringing.”
Dominic is currently in what Wine calls his “terrible twos” phase.
“Throwing fits over nothing,” she said. “His attitude right now is he wants what he wants and if he doesn’t get it he’s throwing a fit.”
Regardless of how terrible the nature of Dominic’s twos may be, however, Wine is eager to graduate and finally live with her family every day. She plans on obtaining her teaching credentials near Concord and then finding a job in the area.
“I’m going home,” she said.