University of Tennessee Athletics
LADY VOL SWIMMING & DIVING DIARIES - JACQUE FESSEL
January 17, 2006 | Women's Swimming & Diving
Jan. 17, 2006
Ever since I became a Lady Vol, I have had one dream; to make this team a top-10 competitive squad and see as many ladies as possible make it to NCAAs. During my first year, there were only two freshmen that made the NCAA squad, Noelle Bassi and I. Noelle decided to leave after her freshman year which left me as the only returning NCAA qualifier. I have to admit it was extremely exciting, but very lonely at the same time. Sophomore year more ladies qualified on the relay and then junior year we had five ladies competing at the NCAAs. I was happy that more ladies were qualifying, but not satisfied because there was not very much excitement as a team to do great things. It seemed quite individual and a lot of people seemed satisfied with being just ok. Then came an even harder time in my career at UT when Dan resigned. I loved everything that I was a part of and to see someone so close to me resign broke my heart.
After all the change in the past year, this season was the beginning of a new era. We had a new coach, a bunch of new young ladies and a new training program. It has been a long hard road. With all of the change there was much skepticism from a bunch of the returning swimmers, including myself.
The beginning of the season was hard. I know there were many tears shed and what made it harder was that I needed to change and accept what was going on around me otherwise I would be holding myself and the team back from a great deal of success. After all of the hard training we had been doing, and all of the early success we had at Purdue, many of us wondered if it could get any harder in practice, especially during Christmas training. Before we left for our training trip to Sarasota, Fla., I was terrified, along with a bunch of my teammates. Little did we know that this trip would change our lives and our team forever.
While we were on our training trip, we practiced hard twice a day twice through cold, windy and rainy weather in the sunshine state. The week became very hard on us physically and mentally. On one of the last nights in Florida, we had a team meeting to figure out what we wanted from ourselves as a team this season and how we could make it happen starting with our next practice. On sheets of orange post-it paper, we each wrote down what our team goals were for the rest of the season. From every answer, we came up with three main words that described a successful season for our team: pride, support and belief. The last practice we had was a very hard set of thirteen one hundreds, all out. That was a big test for our team to show support for each other, pride in ourselves and our teammates and the belief that we could take on a hard set and conquer it.
That practice was one of the most amazing practices I have ever seen our team do. We killed the set! Then we finished the practice with an enthusiastic, great cheer as a team. At that moment, I thought I was going crazy because a small part of me did not want that week to end. I am not the kind of swimmer that loves practice, but I do love passion and intensity, and as a team, I had never seen it like it was that day. Every day since then, I have realized how much I love and cherish this team. After being a part of something like that and seeing everyone stay on track striving to get better everyday, I don't feel alone now and I don't want to leave. This year, the team is everything I have ever hoped for.
After all of the hard work we have done this year, I see nothing but great things and unbelievable success at the end of the year for us. I believe we are going to surprise ourselves and everyone across the country with how great we perform. I wish my time as a Lady Vol and a member of this team would never end. We still have an exciting road ahead of us, but I am going to miss every moment that I have shared with this team. To all of my teammates; I love you and together we are going to be that competitive top-10 team. It is our time.
