By Erin Bruehl
The Journal News
WEST NYACK - The first time Aleksa Akerfelds met Aaron Peirsol, it was at the 2004 Athens Olympics.
Peirsol, her favorite Olympic swimmer, walked into a Nike tent where Akerfelds was and she had her picture taken with Peirsol wearing his gold medals.
So when Akerfelds, a Bronxville senior, heard Peirsol and fellow Olympic gold medalist Josh Davis were coming to Felix Festa Middle School yesterday to host the first Mutual of Omaha Breakout Swim Clinic with the New York Sharks, she wanted to go.
She blew up the picture with Peirsol and brought it with her for him to sign, which he gladly did.
Akerfelds was just one of more than 140 swimmers, ranging from 6-year-olds to college students, who participated in the clinic.
Peirsol is the current world record holder in both the 100-meters and 200 backstroke events and won three gold medals at Athens. Davis is a three-time Olympic gold medalist from the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.
“It is a really good learning experience. People look up to them, and it is so exciting,” Akerfelds said. “Aaron Peirsol is by far my favorite Olympian. Everything they were saying related (to her swimming) and they gave us so much good information. It means a lot to everyone who is here.”
Davis and Peirsol provided instruction on all four strokes, and the swimmers participated in stroke drills.
All swimmers took away something from the clinic, with Andrew Katz of Suffern getting some personal instruction from Peirsol on his backstroke.
“I’ve always been taught to rotate as far as possible,” Katz said. “Aaron stopped me and told me not to rotate so much that it leads to more injuries and if you over rotate on one shoulder, you have to over compensate on the other side so it ends up slowing you down.”
Swimmers also received T-shirts, autographed posters and DVDs.
Both Davis and Peirsol spoke to the swimmers, with Davis emphasizing the things a swimmer needs to do to reach goals, ranging from good fitness and technique to having good relationships. Davis has a clinic company, the Ultimate Technique Swim Clinics, and now that he is retired from Olympics training, he likes to teach.
“This is a new format, there is new fun stuff for the kids,” he said of the Mutual of Omaha clinic. “Normally it is not possible to have two Olympians and here it is, which is nice. We take pride in developing both the swimmer and the person.”
Todd Langenmayr, the head coach of the Sharks, had been speaking with Davis and Peirsol for a year trying to work out a time for them to come. He knew them from his travels to Texas every year to learn from Eddie Reese (Peirsol’s coach).
It just happened to work out that they could come together with the Mutual of Omaha clinic.
“These Olympians, the kids all look up to them. These are their movie stars, they watch them on television, it is pretty special that they do this,” Langenmayr said.
Peirsol is currently training for the 2008 Olympics and took the day off practice to come from Texas with Davis. He enjoys helping younger swimmers.
“It’s good to give back,” he said. “You have to find time to do this type of stuff. (It is important in swimming) to have fun and (they should know) swimming is pretty unique. There is a lot of hard work involved and patience in this sport is really important.”