As the swim season kicks into high gear, the UCLA swim and dive team has an opportunity to prepare and refine its craft ahead of championship meets.
Friday will be the first of a two-day dual meet with Washington State in Pullman for the Bruins.
This meet comes after UCLA beat Utah at home 157-134 last Saturday. According to junior breaststroker and sprint freestyler Taylor Carlson, Washington State will be similar to Utah.
Traveling to Washington could have some extra benefits for the Bruins. This year, the Pac-12 championships will be held in Federal Way, Wash. Carlson, along with the rest of the team, sees this as a great way to prepare for the Pac-12 championships.
“Since it’s up in Washington and it’s an indoor pool, it will be similar to Pac-12s, just a smaller meet,” Carlson said. “Traveling in general gets people tired and throws people off, but having a travel meet before we go to Pac-12s helps us get all of that out of the way.”
Freshman breaststroker Ashley Tse noted that this will be especially helpful for her to prepare for the Pac-12 championships, something she has never experienced before.
“Since I am a freshman I do not know how Pac-12s will be, but (this meet) is in the same area, has the same flight distance, and it will be cold,” Tse said.
In addition to being prepared to travel, the team has a lot of individual things it is working on ahead of bigger meets that it hopes to put into practice this weekend.
Sophomore backstroker Arlyn Upshaw has been using film to analyze her tendencies. She said she noticed that one arm pulls more water than another and is trying to eliminate this ahead of the championships.
Tse has also been especially careful of her stroke counts or the amount of strokes it takes her to get across the pool. She wants to even them out rather than take a different amount of strokes in each lap.
Carlson said she just wants to “swim faster and keep progressing.”
UCLA is set to face Washington State at 5 p.m.