Gabrielle Smith '19 Recruiting Profile

When I started swimming only 3 years ago, I never realized I would have fallen in love with the sport. As a High School Freshman, I barely knew how to swim but I was extremely eager to learn. I would watch my sister swim for only 2 years prior to that. I would constantly go to her practices, and just watch her. I went to every swim meet I could to learn how everything worked. When I finally became a Freshman, I was eager to hop in the water and learn how to swim. My very first swim meet my 50 freestyle was about a :45, and my 100 freestyle was at about 1:40. Not good at all and I personally feel that I have come extremely far. When high school season was over I knew I wanted to improve so I joined Madras Swim Team (club team) and that made me work even harder, and I improved much more. I swam all year around and by the time my Sophomore swim season came around, I was more than ready. My main goal then was Districts that year, and getting into the top 10 placement. I ended up in the constellation finals and ended with 8^th in my 50 free and 7^th for my 100 free. Way better than the year before. I ended up being to determine, so I then decided to commit to working harder all year to place in the top two so that I can qualify for state. Which is going to be happening on February 9-10. My Senior year, I want to place at State, like 1^st, or 2^nd in the 100 free, and possibly the 100 fly which I have been working on. I am going to work as hard as I can to get there.

 While playing this sport, I never realized that I would fall so in love, but I also didn’t realize that I could be so determined, hardworking, and focused. Swimming has made me extremely proud of myself, which doesn’t normally happen. I was homeschooled for up until 8^th grade. I feel that both swimming and being homeschooled have made me extremely determined, because I had to be self-determined and self-motivated about a lot of things. Because of the motivation I have always had, I found myself getting good grades my Sophomore of High School which meant I qualified for National Honors Society, which I found as a huge honor. Being in honors society has also taught me how much I love serving people, and working for people’s respect. My Freshman year in high school I looked at my high school’s course catalog and immediately went to how do I graduate with Honors? I found it, and I made time and effort for me to get that honor. I am still reaching for that goal, and I am almost there. Some obstacles that have come throughout my life, is life itself. Over the course of two years, it seems that my family has just been through so much, both my parents had gotten sick at the same time which was scary, because it was life or death situations. But all throughout that they kept helping me through everything in my swimming world. All they want is to see me succeed and see me be the best that I can be, as I do for myself as well. Of course, there are practices where the swim sets you are given are more mental than they are physical, and that is something that I gave had to work through a lot. I would go to practice and see how fast one person is or just feel like I can’t push through a set, I must remind myself that it doesn’t matter what anyone else is doing, although everyone being successful and pushing through is cool to see and watch., sometimes I just got focus on me. In college, my goal is not only to swim, but to be academically successful. I am going to make sure I manage my time, I am on time if not early to wherever I am supposed to be, and I want to make sure that I have a little fun. I want college to be the time where I am the best person I feel that I can possibly be.