TRACY CAULKINS: SHE'S NO. 1 - Swimming World Magazine

USS NATIONALS con,,n.e,Ambrose Gaines IV, late ofWinter Haven Fla., grew tired ofloafing by his mom's swimmingpool and watching reruns ofGilligan's Island, so he resumedtraining last winter, came here, wonthe 100-200 free, was second in the500, tied for fourth in the 50 andtook away men's high-point honors.This, of course, is the sameRowdy Gaines who in 1981 setAmerican-U.S. Open records in the100-200 yard freestyle during thecollege season as a senior atAuburn, then a week after NCAAsset the current world record for the100 meter freestyle (49.36) andpromptly retired to a life of leisure.Schubert, head coach for the USAWorld Championship squad,summed up the proceedings atGainesville as follows:"The new faces breaking throughwere very encouraging. Kostoff inthe distances is really exciting andSippy's performance bodes well forthe summer. But we still need a lotof improvement in the women'sback and breast events if we're to becompetitive this summer. We'regoing to have to get some big dropsout of people to stay up with theEast Germans."Perhaps the only discordant noteat Gainesville were the constantcomplaints against the starters. Inthe women's 50 free, for example,two swimmers (Starlirs HeatherStrang and Longhorn's SusieThayer) were thrown out of one ofthe heats for two false starts each;Chinook's Mary Wayte was kayoedfrom the 200 free finals for a pair offalse starts. Then when the heatwent, the recall horn failed and theswimmers (including Tandem'sTorres, who won the race thatnight) went some 30 yards beforethe false start rope was finallydropped.In the men's ,50 there wereinnumerable delays due to falsestarts, caused in the main by swimmerstrying to beat the horn.When asked about the starting,Schubert unequivocally said: '3think (chief starter) Pat Graham didan excellent job. I think whathappened in Torres' heat was unfortunate,but I understand how therecall horn could fail. I also thinkwe should adopt the college trackrule of no false starts, period. Thatway kids would learn to react to thefirst sound and all the cheating thatgoes on would be eliminated."When it was over, it was Mark Schubert and his Mission Viejo Nadadores shouting "'We're No. 1 '" over the clubs third straight combined USS title.UNIVERSITYOFFLORIDAL,~OY GATORSMAW !NATIONAL :CHANPIONS !• -v-; r-, •N~ .... ~L SPONSORSENIOR SWIMMINGsiNCE 19~324 Swimming World/June