End of the Season Banquet & Awards Ceremony!

Who:  All AW-K Swimmers and Divers and their Parents

What:  End-of-the-Season Banquet and Awards Ceremony

When:  Sunday, November 12th, 5-8pm

5-6 pm: Potluck Dinner & Photo Booth

6-8 pm Awards Ceremony

Where:  Appleton West High School Cafeteria

What to Bring:  Please bring a main dish to share (6-8 servings) and one of the following:

Freshmen:  Fruit or Veggies

Sophomores: Drinks for 8--Water bottles, Juice, Soda

Juniors: Salads or Side Dish

Seniors: Desserts

We can't wait to celebrate the season with you!

Coordinating Committee:  Anna Armstrong, Emma Cody, Lexee Funk, Ellie Glynn, Brigita Hull, Evelyn Krafft, Olivia Polczinski, Lizzie Schimmers, and Alexa Van Laanen

Championship Season!

Hi Team!

Championship season is right around the corner, and I thought I'd give you a brief summary of what to expect.

First up is JV Conference on Monday, October 23rd at 5:00 pm at Appleton North.  The JV Conference meet is the Junior Varsity portion of the FVA Conference Meet.  We are allowed unlimited entries in the JV Conference meet, which means that if every single girl wants to swim the 50 free, they can.  Swimmers are allowed (and often do) compete in both the JV and Varsity Conference meets, but they can not compete in the same event at both meets.  There is a 4 event maximum (total for both meets).  There will be a mix of varsity and JV swimmers swimming at JV Conference.  There will be awards (duckies) for 1st-8th place.

The Conference Meet determines the team champion of the FVA Conference, and it will be held at Fond du Lac Aquatic Center on Saturday, October 28th and beginning at 10:30 am. The diving portion of the meet is held at the same location on Friday, October 27th, at 6:00 pm.  Swimmers and divers earn first, second, and honorable mention All-Conference honors for each event based on their finish and receive medals for these top 3 finishers. The format is the same as a dual meet, but the number of teams participating means more heats and a longer meet. Each team gets a total of 27 entries for all individual events and two entries for each relay event.  Some Varsity swimmers will swim all 4 of their events at Varsity Conference, but some may swim 1-3 events at Varsity Conference and the rest at JV Conference.

The WIAA Sectional Meet will be held on Saturday, November 4th at Neenah High School, beginning at Noon.  The diving portion will be held at Neenah High School on Friday night. Each team gets a total of 18 entries for all individual events and one entry for each relay event. Medals are awarded to the winners in each event, plus any other state qualifiers.  State qualifying comes from winning your event at one of the 6 sectional meets or finishing as one of the next fastest 18 swimmers in the state.

The WIAA State Meet will be held on Saturday, November 11th at 3:00 pm at the UW Madison aquatic facility.  It is a great achievement to qualify for this meet celebrating the state's top swimmers.

Our team banquet will be held on Sunday, November 12th.  More details on our big season-ending celebration will be posted soon.

As always, please let me know if you have any questions or concerns.  I'm so excited to be heading into this part of the season!

With AW-K Pride,

Coach Vicki

Other People's Kids

Hi Team!

I wanted to share this post that I wrote back in 2014.  It *absolutely* applies to you guys, too. I love you all, and I love being your coach.

With AW-K Pride,

Coach Vicki

Other People's Kids

When I was pregnant with Maddie, I could literally freak myself out worrying about things.  

I worried that I wouldn't be as good a mother of two as I was a mother of one.  

I worried about juggling two of everything:  diaper changes, nap schedules, baths, bedtime routines.  

Most of all, I worried that I could never love another child as much as I loved Emily.  

For 17 months, Emily was it.  

I funneled all my love into baby Emily.  

I worried about how I could split that love into two.

I remember sharing my concerns with John's mom.  

She was a mother of two, I knew she would know what I was talking about.  

What she told me was this:  you don't have to divide your love, 

your heart expands to include all of those you love.

She was right, of course.  

I had absolutely no problem loving Maddie as much as I loved Emily.  

And then when we added Jack to the mix, my heart grew even more.

 

When I started coaching, I found that my heart could grow to include loving other people's kids, too.

People often ask me my why I coach.  

The hours are inconvenient, and the pay is one step above a volunteer job.

This is what I say every time:  I coach because I love my swimmers. 

I coach because each year I get a new batch of other people's kids to teach, mentor, and love.

I coach because it reminds me of how big my heart is.

I am so thankful that other parents share their kids with me.

My life would not be the same without coaching.

Hands down, I have the best job in the world.

XO,
Vicki

Senior Night!

Hi Team!

Believe it or not, tomorrow night is Senior Night!  I don't know about you, but I am having a hard time handling how fast this season is going.  I'm definitely not ready to say goodbye to this year's seniors--they are such an amazing group of women!

Here are a few details about tomorrow night:

**Timers should plan on arriving by 5:15 for a brief meeting.
**Diving will take place right at the beginning of the meet at 5:30.
**We will introduce the AW-K seniors and the Fond du Lac seniors at the break after the 50 free.

**Our senior celebration will take place immediately following the meet.  Please plan on staying for about a 1/2 hour to help recognize our fantastic seniors. 

I hope to see a big bunch of you at the pool tomorrow night!

With AW-K Pride,

Coach Vicki

AW-K vs ONL and the Quest for the Giant Pear

Hi Team,

It's time for the 3rd annual AW-K vs ONL Quest for the Giant Pear!  

Three years ago, one of our captains, Halee Fritsch, really wanted to do a community service project with the team.  Of course, we all thought that was an excellent idea, so the Halee Fritsch Food Drive was born (I named it that--not Halee).  Anyway, we thought it would be fun to challenge another team to a contest to see which team could bring the most non-perishable goods to a dual meet.  I reached out to the ONL coach, Heidi Wera, and she loved the idea. I decided we needed to compete for a super-cool trophy that would stay with the team that won each year. The past two years AW-K has won, and the giant pear (pictured above) has been proudly displayed on my desk.  To me, it represents AW-K giving back to the community in a fun, positive way.

Tuesday night we will once again battle in the pool and for the giant pear.  Please consider cleaning out your pantry and carting all of your non-perishables to the pool Tuesday night.  Everything we collect that night will be donated.  The team with the most items, wins!  Let's keep the giant pear at our pool and help a whole lot of people in the process!

Hope to see a big bunch of you at the meet on Tuesday night!  Timers should arrive by 5:15 for a short meeting.  The meet begins at 5:30.

With AW-K Pride,
Coach Vicki

Homecoming Week(s) Schedule Changes

Hi Team!

I just wanted to make sure everyone is on the right page with the upcoming Homecoming week(s) schedule changes.

Tomorrow (Wednesday, September 20th) is the Kimberly Homecoming Parade.  The Kimberly girls are excused from practice in order to march in the parade.  The West girls have regular practice from 3:45-5:30.  We will do Tai Chi and film study.  We will not get in the water.  Kimberly girls who choose not to participate in the Homecoming Parade are required to come to practice instead. Kimberly girls need to wear team apparel to the parade--team t-shirt, sweatshirt, or parka. Megan Karrmann and Nicole del Plaine are the captains in charge of the Kimberly Homecoming Parade info. Check the team Facebook page for more details.  Kimberly band members are excused--have fun marching with the band!

All athletes who need to leave Saturday's Neenah Invite early to attend the Kimberly Homecoming dance need to make sure I have their completed and signed travel release form by Friday afternoon.  If I do not have the signed form, you will not be able to leave early.  The swimmers who are leaving early can ride the bus to the Invite if they want.  We load the bus at 6:55.  The bus leaves at 7:00 am.

Next Thursday, September 28th is the West Homecoming parade.  Please note:  this date was change after the schedule was made.  The parade is on Thursday, not Friday.  The entire team will march in the West Homecoming parade, which is right after school.  Kimberly athletes should plan on coming to West at the regular time.  All athletes should wear team clothing.  The entire team has morning practice that day.  Everyone needs to be in the door by 5:30 am.  We will be in the water from 5:45-6:45.  I will prepare breakfast bags for the entire team if they want one.  Breakfast bags for the JV will be $4 and include a bagel, cream cheese or peanut butter, cheese stick or hard-boiled egg, and a cup of Greek yogurt.  I will take orders from the JV early next week.  Friday we will have normal practice from 3:45-5:00.  There is no morning practice on Friday.  Jacquie Chippeaux and Hailey Bevers are the captains in charge of the West Homecoming parade info. Please check the Facebook page for more details.

The Fond du Lac Invite on September 30th is Varsity only.  Varsity athletes who want to leave early to attend the West Homecoming dance need to fill out and return a completed travel release form to me by Friday, the 29th.

I think that should be the last of the schedule changes for the rest of the season.  Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns!

With AW-K Pride,
Coach Vicki

All Kinds of Thank Yous!

 Hi Team!

Holy cow!  The last two weeks have been amazing!  And busy!  And inspiring!  I'm sorry to be so far behind on blog posts, and I'm doubly sorry that some of these thank you's are so late!

First of all, I'd like to say a big thank you to the September 1st Lambeau clean-up crew!  I was a little worried about getting enough volunteers to come out on the Friday before Labor Day.  All that worrying was for nothing, though, as a big bunch of you showed up, and we had Lambeau cleaned up in no time!  I'd like to give a special shout-out to Dan Angiulli, who came out to help clean even though his daughter graduated last May!

Dan now joins a small but amazing group of alumni parents who have showed up to clean Lambeau after their child graduated, the other being Chad Held's parents who came to clean in June.  We also had a few alumni swimmers come out to clean this summer--Meghan Harper (and her boyfriend!), Chad Held, and Connor O'Brien are all super-alumni!

Back at the pool, the girls have been working extremely hard getting ready to start meet season.  All of our new swimmers joined the 200 club before August was over.  I can't tell you how amazing that is; most of those girls couldn't even swim a 25 without stopping when we started on August 8th.  Our huge group of new swimmers inspire me every single day!

On September 5th, we kicked off our Conference season with a big win over Appleton East.  That night was also Parent Night, and I can't tell you how awesome it was to see our athletes and their parents span 3 sides of the pool!

I'm pretty sure our success that night was due in large part to the excellent team meal the parents made on Monday night.  The spaghetti and meatballs were AMAZING!  Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone on that meal team!

There were lots and lots of good swims that night. For me, the highlight of the night had to be the JV 200 Free Relay.  We had athletes in every single lane (28 total) competing at the same time.  That one heat had more athletes than were on the whole team my first year!  Amazing!!

On Friday night, the Varsity competed in the Terror Relays, our home Invite.  There is no time when the phrase "It Takes A Village" is more appropriate than before a 10-team swim invite.  Thank you to every single person who helped make the Terror Relays such a success!  There were parents and volunteers who set up and ran concessions, prepared food and fed the coaches and officials, timed behind the blocks, helped with awards, and cleaned up afterwards.  I seriously could not have made it through that night without all of you!  THANK YOU SO MUCH!

The next morning, the Varsity was up bright and early to swim at the Patriot Pentathlon.  It's pretty hard to compete back-to-back like that, but the AW-K ladies made it look easy!

 They took home a few awards, too.  The pile was so pretty, I hated to pass them out!  :)

This past week we shifted into Phase 2 of our training cycle.  The entire team added weight training and core work to the work they are doing in the pool, and the varsity added morning practices into the mix.  My goal was to make them sore.  Based on their feedback, it's working.  :)

Our fabulous parents provided another delicious meal this week, even though it was a bye week.  The girls went crazy for the chicken Alfredo!  Thank you so much to Monday's meal team--you guys knocked it out of the park!

On Saturday night the girls traded in their swimsuits for dresses and head to Pullmann's for dinner.  It was so fun seeing the girls with dry hair and makeup! The girls spend so much time with their heads underwater, it's fun to see them just laugh and have fun together over a meal.  We even got to see Haley get asked to Homecoming (!).

This week we head to Neenah High School twice.  On Tuesday we have our dual meet.  It starts at 5:30, and our divers will compete during the meet, after the 50 free.  On Saturday, the entire team heads back to NHS for the Neenah Invite.  The girls need to be at West by 7:00 to load the bus. The meet starts at 9:00 am.  Seating is always tight at Neenah, so come early if you want a seat.

I can't tell you how much I am enjoying this year's team--this group of girls is truly special!  Thanks for all you do to support them and the entire AW-K program.  I hope to see a big bunch of you at NHS this week!

With AW-K Pride,
Coach Vicki