M. Swimming preps for Harvard

Throughout the season, the Penn men's swimming team has had its share of ups and downs.

The Quakers have faced a number of injuries, swum in a variety of pools and gained experience against all but the most ominous of their Ivy League foes.

Penn's tumultuous regular season will come to an end this weekend when the Red and Blue travel to Boston to swim against a menacing Harvard squad.

The Crimson have won six consecutive EISL Championships and are undefeated so far this season.

"Harvard's one of the best teams in the country," Penn coach Mike Schnur said. "They have, if not the best swimmer in the league in every event, they have one of the two best."

Going into the meet, the Quakers are not expecting to be able to defeat the Crimson, but are hoping to simply gain experience.

"There's nothing you can do when there is such a talent difference," Schnur said. "We'll battle it as hard as we can and try to set ourselves up for the end of the season.

"Our goals are to get as many good swims as we can for ourselves and to go in there and have fun and to sharpen up our racing skills."

Though they dominate the Ivy League in most of the events, Harvard's real weapons are its distance freestylers.

Crimson sophomore John Cole leads the distance pack, generally competing in the 1650, 500, and 200 yard freestyle events.

"John Cole is one of the best swimmers in America," Schnur said "Really one of the best swimmers in the world."

His time of 15:06.14 in the 1650 yard freestyle is almost a minute faster than Penn junior Nate Pinney, the team's season leader in that event.

In last year's meeting, the Crimson demolished the Quakers, 198-86, at Scheerr Pool. However, Penn was able to win a few races and hopes to steal a couple this time, as well.

The only advantage that the Quakers may hold over their foes is that Harvard will be competing two days in a row. The Crimson will race against Dartmouth and Cornell in Hanover, N.H., on Saturday and then face the Quakers on Sunday.

Though each dual meet is of some importance, Penn is using this meet primarily to prepare for the Championships.

The EISLs will be held in Boston from March 1-3, so this match will give the Quakers an opportunity to swim in Harvard's Blodgett Pool prior to the Championship meet.

"One of the reasons that this is a good meet for us is that this is where championships are," Schnur said.

Penn's swimmers will travel to Harvard on Saturday and hold practice that evening to prepare for the meet on Sunday. This will allow them additional experience in the pool.

"We're going to train Saturday night so they have enough experience learning the walls, learning the blocks, learning the pool," Schnur said.

The Quakers hope this additional training will translate into a better showing this year both against Harvard and in the championship races.

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