Age Is Just a Number: Achieve Your Dreams at Any Stage in Your Life

PrologueI’ve been old before. I was old when I was 27 and I got divorced. I was old when I was 35 and I couldn’t get pregnant. I was really old when I was 39 and my father died. But when I was 41 and I woke up in a dorm in the Olympic Village in Beijing, I didn’t feelold. I felt merely–and, yes, happily–middle-aged. “The waterdoesn’t know how old you are,” I’d been telling anyone who wouldlisten for the prior two years. Though sometimes, I have to admit,I would think to myself, Good thing it can’t see my wrinkles.On the morning of the 50-meter freestyle Olympic finals, I setmy alarm for six o’clock. I’m a type A person, or as some of myfriends call me, type A++. Basically, I’m one of those people whohas to do everything I do to the fullest extent of my ability, as fastas I can. When I recently moved houses I didn’t sleep until all theboxes were unpacked and all the pictures hung on the walls. I don’tlike to do anything halfway, and I’d set this crazy goal for myself:to make my fifth Olympic team as a 41-year-old mother. And thetruth was I didn’t just want to make the team, either. I wanted amedal. I wanted to win. Along the way, I also wanted to prove tothe world that you don’t have to put an age limit on your dreams,that the real reason most of us fear middle age is that middle ageis when we give up on ourselves.It was a pretty crazy thing to be doing, especially under thecircumstances. If you’ve ever had a toddler or watched a parentyou adore die, you’ll know what I’m talking about. Young childrenand dying parents are truly exhausting, and I had one of each as Imade my comeback. But I knew in my heart I could succeed–aslong as I left no stone unturned.The race started at 10 a.m., so I’d worked out my schedule leadingup to the race. I needed to drink my Living Fuel breakfastshake at 6:15 a.m. so I’d have time to pack my roller bag–twopractice suits, two racing suits, two pairs of goggles, two racingcaps, two towels, and my dress sweats, in case I got a medal–beforeI caught the 6:45 a.m. bus over to the Water Cube. I’d then do mywhole routine–wake-up swim, shower, get mashed (a massagetechnique done with the feet), do my warm-up swim, get stretched,and put on my racing suit–all before I headed to the ready room,where all the swimmers wait before a race. My teammates, I haveto tell you, thought that roller bag was the funniest thing in theworld. They were all 15 to 25 years younger than me, the ages Iwas at my first, second, and third Olympics. (I was already beyondtheir ages by my fourth.) Their bodies were like noodles, and theyall carried their gear in backpacks. But I’d noticed that backpackstraps made my trapezoid muscles tense up. Swimming fast, forme, is all about staying loose. So I had a roller bag. If I looked likea nutty old lady–fine.The Beijing morning was humid and dark when I left theOlympic Village. All the other swimmers were probably still asleep.I think that the only other person awake in the Village was MarkSchubert, the National team coach of the USA Olympic swim3ming team. Mark had also been my coach at my first Olympics, 24years ago. And he’d been my coach at Mission Viejo, where I’dgone to high school to train at age 16. I love Mark. He’s like myfairy godfather, constantly dropping into my life at just the righttime, giving me what I need, and then disappearing again. Thatmorning he’d woken up in the Beijing predawn to help me preparefor my race. We’d come a long way together. Though hewasn’t my coach in the months leading up to the Olympics, he’dtaught me the discipline and the commitment to detail I now soprized. We were now going–literally–one more lap.I rolled my bag out to the sidewalk as quietly as possible. I didn’twant to wake anybody–partly because, as a mother, I knew thevalue of sleep. But selfishly, I also wanted my competitors to stayin their beds. The longer they slept, I told myself, the greater myadvantage and the more time I had, relative to them, to prepare.Since my daughter had been born I’d been saying that wakingup with a kid in the middle of the night was going to give me anedge at some point. I hoped this was it.Over at the Water Cube the competition pool was empty, so Iyelled “Good morning!” to Bob Costas, who was broadcasting upin the rafters, found my lane, and dove in. I don’t usually do awake-up swim in the competition pool, but the 50-meter freestyleis a really strategic race. Time can contract or stretch out. It’sonly one length of the pool–just 24 or 25 seconds–but it’s alsoeasy to get lost. If I’ve learned one thing from all my races and allmy years, it’s that the Olympics can be disorienting, and the middleof things is where we tend to lose the plot. Part of my plan for themorning was to learn exactly where I was going to be in the waterat every stroke of the race. So as I swam I memorized all the landmarks,the intake jets, where all the cameras were on the bottomof the pool. That way I’d have markers in addition to the lines 15meters from the start and 15 meters from the end. I’d know whento keep a little energy in reserve, and when to take my last breathand gun for the wall.More was riding on this race than on any other race I’d swum.Back in Florida I had a child, Tessa, who’d one day study this raceto find out who her mother was. I had a coach, Michael Lohberg,who’d believed in me before anyone else, who now lay in a hospitalbed with a rare blood disorder, fighting for his life. I’d had afather, Edward, whom I’d lost to cancer just as I’d started this comeback,and who’d wanted so much for me to realize my dreams, andwho I felt was with me every day.And most unexpectedly, at least for me, I had a lot of fans.I’m not being coy when I say the fans were unexpected. I’msaying they were unexpected because I didn’t yet understand howovercoming perceived odds works–how even just attemptingthat can inspire people, and how the energy from those people canboomerang back to you, giving you the strength and energy youneed to reach your goals. So I was surprised–deeply surprised,and also grateful–that my dream was contagious. I’ve always beengood in a relay, but I’ve never been quite as strong in my individualevents. I’ve just never been at my best when I’m swimmingin front of the whole world just for myself. But now I had thesupport of everyone nearing or over 40, everyone who’d ever feltthey were too old or too out of shape to do something but stillwanted to give it a try. I had everyone who didn’t want to give up.I just couldn’t let all those people down. I felt they were dependingon me almost in the same way my relay teammates did. Wewere in this together. I couldn’t entice so many women and meninto dreaming a little longer and aiming a little higher, and thennot win.Of course, as anyone who knows me will tell you, I wanted towin anyway. I’m pathologically competitive. I hate to lose. That’sjust what I’m like. If you and I were in a sack race at a field day,trying to jump across the grass with our legs stuck in bags, makingtotal fools of ourselves, I’d still want to cross that finish line first.I’d give it everything I had. But now I wanted to win this race notjust for myself. I wanted to win it for everyone who believed–everyone who needed to believe–that a 40-plus mom could stillcompete.At 7:25 a.m. I got out of the pool and walked to the locker roomto take a hot shower. The wake-up swim and the shower wereboth part of an effort to get my core temperature up. Everybody’score temperature drops during sleep, and that temperature needsto rise if you want to swim really fast. My plan for the remainingtwo hours before my race was to have my stretchers, Anne andSteve, mash–or massage–me with their feet, then swim again,then have Anne and Steve stretch me, and then put on the bottomhalf of my racing suit, with plenty of time remaining to lie on amassage table in the team area and listen to a bunch of rockers halfmy age sing a song called “Kick Some Ass.” The mashing and thestretching were critical to my performance. All the other kids inthe Olympics might have thought they could do their best by justswimming a little warm-up, pinwheeling their arms a few timesand diving in. But not me. I was the same age as a lot of thoseathletes’ mothers. Michael Phelps had started calling me “Mom”eight years earlier. I needed every advantage.Physically, I have to say I didn’t feel great–stiff, still not fullyrecovered from the prior day’s semifinals. (Okay, let me pause righthere and say it: I’m totally fine with aging except for the recoverytime. Is it really necessary to take 48 hours to recover from a24-second sprint?) I also felt sick to my stomach with anxiety. I’mlike that, even after all these years: On the day of a big race, I feellike I’m going to throw up. I know it’s part of the adrenaline surgeI need in order to psych up and win. But my relationship to thatsurge is like an addiction. I run toward it, crave it, can’t live toolong without it, and then it makes me feel terrible. That preracenausea gets me every time. I suppose when I stop feeling it I’llknow it’s time to call it quits and hang up my Speedo for good.That day at the Water Cube, as my mother came over to wishme luck, and then came back to wish me luck again, I took a fewswigs of Accelerade to try to calm my nerves. Breathe, Dara, breathe,I told myself. It’ll be over in 24 seconds. Of course, Mark Spitz oncesaid the really great thing about being a competitive swimmer isthat your career ends quickly. He said the reward for all the longhours in the pool is that you get to retire at 23 years old. Oh, well.I was not following Spitz’s schedule (though he, too, attempteda comeback at age 41). So I tried to focus instead on what I’dlearned at the Olympic Trials, where I’d felt so bad just before myfirst heat that I was crying in the hall but swam really well anyway:You don’t have to feel good to swim fast. I must have said it to myselfa hundred times: Don’t freak out, Dara. Remember Trials. You don’thave to feel good to swim fast.Finally, I went down to the team area and lay on a massage tablefor a while, listening to my iPod and watching the muscles in myquads tighten up. Then one of the coaches told me it was time togo to the ready room, which was a good thing. Because despite allmy supposed maturity, for the last 20 minutes I’d been acting likean annoying kid. Every 30 seconds I’d ask: How much longer? Is ittime yet? I couldn’t stand the wait. I’d been working toward thismoment for two years, or 24 years, or 41 years . . . Let’s just say ithad been a long time. I’d done everything I possibly could. I’d assembledthe best team. I’d worked hard and smart. Now the onlything that was happening was that my muscles were tightening up.The ready room is where they put all the athletes just before arace. I hate the place. In the ready room it’s just you and the sevenother girls you’re swimming against, and it’s either hear-a-pindroptense or filled with forced conviviality. When I was youngerI’d sit in the ready room with my Walkman (remember those?),and then my Discman (remember those, too?), staring at my fingernails,always keeping an eye on the trash can so I’d know whereto run to vomit. That day, on purpose, I left my iPod in my rollerbag. But as I ducked my head in to give the official my credentials,I could see everybody else sitting already, messing with their fingernails,or with their caps and goggles, looking sick and miserable.And the room was hot and stuffy.For my entire career I’d been just like them–enjoying myOlympics by putting massive amounts of pressure on myself.Which is to say not enjoying the Olympics at all. But this time Ifelt totally blessed. I was at the Olympics. How cool is that? I’d satwith LeBron James and watched Michael Phelps swim. And guesswhat that’s like? FUN. In just five minutes the eight of us girlswere all about to do something incredible: swim in an Olympicfinal. By pretty much any sane person’s standards, we’d already accomplishedsomething. We were the eight fastest female swimmersin the world. We’d already won. I wanted to enjoy the experience.I wanted them to enjoy the experience. I knew we were all goingout there to try to beat each other, and believe me, I wanted towin. But I felt the occasion called for a joke.“Anybody else hot? Or is it just me?” I called out to the girls. “Ifeel like I’m in menopause.”I saw a smile creep across the lips of Cate Campbell, the frecklyAustralian redhead who up until that moment looked like she wasabout to meet a firing squad. I knew how she felt: like her wholefuture depended on the next five minutes. I now was old enoughto know that there’s a lot of life that happens outside of the pool.That she was going to lose loved ones and yearn for things thatwere outside her control. Swimming is not like real life. You candetermine for yourself how hard and how well you train. Youcan control how you dive, how you turn, how you position yourshoulders for your touch. But I knew what Cate was goingthrough. Swimming fast can feel like the most important thing–the only important thing–in the whole world. I’ve been there,I’ve felt that. She was 16.Maybe it was this perspective that caused me to ham it up justbefore 24 of the most important seconds in my life. Maybe it wasnerves. Whatever the reason, I did. With just a few minutes to gobefore the race, all of us zipped up like sardines in our tight newracing suits, officials walked us down the hall to the rows of chairsunder the bleachers. My mantra for the past two years had been todo everything all the other swimmers weren’t doing–that extravertical kick in practice, those long hours of active recovery–soI’d have something over them. But now the mom in me came out.I wanted to take care of everybody. I wanted all these girls to enjoythe event. I wanted them to relax. I knew that Libby Trickett, Cate’steammate, a really spunky Australian who’d gone into the Gamesranked first in the 50 free, had just gotten married. So I asked herif she was going to have kids, and before I knew it, as 17,000 fanssat waiting for us to come out and compete, I was telling themwhat it’s like to give birth to a child. And not just telling them. Ihad my feet up, as if they were in stirrups, yelling like I was inlabor, just as I might have if I was sitting around my house yukkingit up with my closest friends.Then it came time to walk out to the blocks for that long, fastlap. When I got to my lane, I dried off my block with a towel, lestI slip. Then I took off my sneakers and my two T-shirts, and walkedto the edge of the pool to splash my body and face. Back at theblocks, I roughed up the skin on my forearms and hands on theblock’s surface so I’d have a better feel for the water. Each time,just before a race, the officials blow a series of whistles–first abunch of short bursts to warn you to get all your clothes off exceptyour suit, cap, and goggles. Then a long whistle meaning it’stime to get on your block in ready position. After that, the startingsignal begins the race.When I heard the long whistle I took my mark, with my rightleg back, my left toes curled over the cool metal edge, staringdown my long blue lane. I had just one word in my head, tone,reminding me to keep my body tight, in a toned position to knifeinto the water on my start. I knew everybody who dreamed mydream with me was on that block, too. But I also knew, at thestarting signal, that I’d be diving into the water alone.