omar enriquez is really turning heads this year so far. his pair of wins in the 1650 and the 200 fly and his runner up finish in the 500 against auburn really showed how tough this kid really is. him and jensen ried must be training really hard every day, look forward to seeing them at big 12's and ncaa's.

Dude is definitely stepping up in what had been a weakness in past years. Getting that B-cut in the 1650 was impressive for being in the middle of winter training.

What are his best times like, either in or before A&M?

I agree totally. Omar is a baller. Going to be interesting to see how his addition affects the SMU and LSU duals that the men have been losing in recent years. The guys team is really starting to round into form across the board.

I am also impressed. He doesn't have too far to go to get the A&M records in everything 500 and longer.

I hope he is a better student than Israel Duran.

Does anyone know if he tapers well? Some distance guys - like Klueh - swim fast all the time in mid-season and don't drop significantly when tapered.

Blu- I think i remember seeing when he first got here that his mile was around 15:10 and 500 being 5:19 and 400 was the school record.

Cooper I dont know how close you are to the program but good for Mr Injury Ried if he really is helping Enriquez out in practice.

I agree I hope he is a much better student and will be able to help the team out for 4 years instead of the 2 duran had

Omar's a good student, no worries there.

You won't have to wait long to find out Spicewood. I'll take my chances on anyone B-cutting a mile on Jan. 9.

favre - check your math. There is no way his 500 time could have been 5:19 if his 1650 was 15:10. Or 1500M at 15:10. His intermediate splits would have been better than 5:19.

5:19 won't win 4A regionals in Texas.

His bio says he was 3:57 in the 400M. So he splits 59 per 100M - or about 52 per 100Y. That leads to a 4:30-ish 500 SCY.

Yeah I saw 5:19 and was incredulous. I mean, we have good coaches, but nobody drops 40 seconds from 4 months of good coaching...

Between him and the crop of sprinters we're getting in next year (always gotta have sprinters, they can score more points w/ relays), I think the future is bright for the men's program.

i agree with favre, i think were all hoping that injury ried can step up big time after pampering his shoulder for two years. maybe having such a talented young distance star can help the entire distance crew reach a whole new level.

yikes, a simple typo and a guy gets railed. too bad the 4 and 5 are right next to each other on the keyboard

But on topic, Omar is definitely a huge asset to the Mens program. I have heard good things about his schooling (better than Israel at least) so hopefully we can squeeze the full 4years out of him!

My bad didn't even realize I had typed a 5 there, didn't think it was that big of a deal, there are no college swimmers anywhere that have that slow of a time. My bad king spice. All I was saying is that is what I thought I had seen when I had looked at this year's freshman class, no source at all.

Let's give Omar credit for his speed. I just suggested Favre check what he posted. I didn't jump on him. Some people are soooooo sensitive on this board.

There is a button on Texags - just to the left of the big X - that you can use to edit your post. If you use it real fast after you post something - you can fix an error before even goblu reads it!

[This message has been edited by SpicewoodAg (edited 1/11/2010 4:08p).]

I heard Byrne speak at the Houston A&M club. He said the only varsity sport we have that lost a scholarship for failure to graduate an athlete was Men's Swimming. He said it was because we have so many international students they get homesick and leave early don't take summer classes etc. If this is the case do we want to keep recruiting internationally?

Beretta, I'll have to confer with the anonymiss and his pissy-posse to make sure that I'm allowed to comment on that.

There's been four foreign swimmers (Greg Widmer, Israel Duran, Bojan Zdesar, and Gilad Zilberman) and a diver (David Kalec) leave in the last 5-6 years and only two of those were for the 'homesick' reason. There have nearly been as many, if not more, U.S. kids leave the team over the same period of time. The combination of the two issues is what caused them to lose that scholarship -- not just foreigners. Additionally, four of the five foreigners either went to NCAA's or were good enough to. Some guys just don't work out, figuratively not literally, the way everyone would like them to. It happens in every sport. The smaller the squad size, the more chance it has of hurting the APR.

Less than a third of the team is currently international and almost all of them have either been or will be attending NCAA's at some point. I personally like the balance the coaches have struck and the results are beginning to speak for themselves.

[This message has been edited by Look Out Below (edited 1/13/2010 11:39a).]

I don't know enough about the issue or even what the rule is he spoke about. Has it been a problem in the past or only this/last year?

Losing a scholarship on the men's team is huge - that's 10%.

Beretta - I think Byrne is talking about the NCAA measurement of Academic Progress Rate (APR). When a program's APR falls too low they are subject to scholarship loss.

I did not know Jay lost a scholarship. Does he have it back now?

BTW - I have heard Balasz is an excellent student and very smart. We need more like him, foreign or domestic!

LOB, what about the issue of not sticking around to take summer classes?

And what's Byrne's alterior motive for putting the blame on the internationals?

When was the scholarship lost? Do we have it back?

I have no idea whether the scholarship loss is current or was backdated. It doesn't seem to be having any ill effect on the team's results this year though as it looks like they are on pace to win more dual meets than any time in the Jay Holmes tenure.

It's been my experience that oftentimes the foreign student-athletes (as a whole) are generally better students than the homegrown ones. Many of them recognize the opportunity they are getting to come to America and get a paid education and they take full advantage of it. There are absolutely exceptions both ways for sure however. It really just depends on each individual.

Many foreign students do stick around and train during the summer once they realize how effective the coaching they are getting is. Who knows why that came up or why 'blame' may have been pointed that direction. By posting, I just wanted to clarify and, I guess, defend the foreign kids. Generally they are very good, hard-working kids in both the classroom and the athletic venues and should not be used as scapegoats.

I really don't think Byrne meant to blame them it was just more of a statement that it was harder to keep the point up because the sport is much more international than the others. By no means did he suggest we should not recruit internationally. The comment was made in discussing all sports and our ability to graduate students. We have had some great success in football with players getting duel degrees, masters degrees etc. before there eligibility is up. Red shirting certainly helps that.

In fact I was encouraged after hearing him speak. Bottom line is he wants to win championships in every sport we put on the field. So far he has three. If it takes foreign swimmers to do that I'm sure he's behind it all the way.

We just need to make sure they pass their classes and graduate.

I agree that we should not blame the international students. I think academics are more of a priority for some more than others whether it is an international student or US student.

The women's swimming team seems to do very well academically. And the men's team seem to be having less men ineligible than in year's past.

I did hear that many of the diver's (both men and women) are struggling academically..not sure if they are international or American. Do they count towards the APR as well? Possibly they also contributed to the loss of the scholarship? Do you think the women are in jeopardy of having a scholarship taken away?

Swimmom - divers count toward the APR just as much as the swimmers do, be they American or foreign...it is possible that could have contributed to the men's loss of a scholarship...the divers have had more recent turnover from American kids leaving early than foreign kids though...I don't think a foreign diver has left the program since 2006.

I am 99.9% sure the women are in no danger of having a scholarship taken away...not that many women leave the program early and, based on the annual academic award stories that get sent out from the athletic dept., they are among the most high-performing teams on campus....I think I remember seeing a story that said three of them got an award for having cum 4.0's...not bad for a team that's #6 in the country

quote:

---

By posting, I just wanted to clarify and, I guess, defend the foreign kids. Generally they are very good, hard-working kids in both the classroom and the athletic venues and should not be used as scapegoats.

---

agreed. the group of international guys the coaches have been bringing in recently have been great. but you have to admit, early on in the beginning stages of the international recruiting (5-6 years ago), we did get a few "bad eggs", for lack of a better term.

And there were some domestic guys that also helped contribute to the loss of that scholarship, so its not all on the international ones. Each guy (those mentioned above, and those who were not named) had a very different story that brought about their departure. not trying to really defend those guys, but there really isnt a blanket reason for why they all left and cost the guys a scholarship.

EDIT: I missed this part of LOBs post, sorry for my duplicate info.

quote:

---

There have nearly been as many, if not more, U.S. kids leave the team over the same period of time

---

[This message has been edited by texagg09 (edited 1/13/2010 2:34p).]

Women athletes almost always do better than male athletes academically. You can google "ncaa apr" and it won't take long to see the data.

Even if you take out sports where professional options exist (football, basketball, baseball) - women do better.

So can anyone confirm when we lost the scholarship and when do we or did we get it back?

"Beretta, I'll have to confer with the anonymiss and his pissy-posse to make sure that I'm allowed to comment on that"

GoBlu...I highly doubt that I am worried about your thoughts. I just get on you because I think youre a f-n *****. Nothing but a bitter "athlete" wanna-be who likes picking apart stuff he has no inner-knowledge of...and hides like pansies on here under fake "anonymiss" names (get my SN now?).

Ive always said if we wanted to say who we are i'd comply...but I think youre to much of a puss to come clean.

[This message has been edited by Anonymiss (edited 1/13/2010 9:49p).]

Here we go again...

Funny you just mentioned that Spicewood then hours later the women add an Olympic Trials-qualifying National Merit Scholar.

Like I touched on earlier, it's nice to see the women's team be so successful both in the pool and out. Their program exemplifies what college athletics should be all about.

quote:

---

Women athletes almost always do better than male athletes academically. You can google "ncaa apr" and it won't take long to see the data.

Even if you take out sports where professional options exist (football, basketball, baseball) - women do better.

---

I wonder if you applied the APR formula to the college population as a whole, whether men or women come out on top, and relative to the data for the college-attending population, how the athletes' data compares (both in general, and specifically male vs. female).

Children, children-- can't we all just get along? I'd much rather read something intelligent and worthwhile than watch you two get into a pissing contest about who has the most "inner-knowledge" of the team.

Just to clarify, Beretta: the lost scholarship issue is not an issue anymore. Turns out he was scared of the dark; we found him hiding under his covers. Plugged in the nightlight myself. All is well.

As far as the foreign guys go, 09 & Spice have it right. We've had a few bad apples, but just as many domestic failures. Bottom line, more often than not their attrition is the result of a lack of testicular fortitude rather than mental aptitude. The group we have now seems to be on the ball. I think that the results speak for themselves. Holmes & Boyd have clearly figured things out.

For the record. Mr. Ried has come back from two shoulder surgeries. I can't even imagine the mental anguish those lost seasons must have inflicted, but we can all agree that he has shown phenomenal perseverance. The fact that he is still training speaks volumes about his character.

Goblu - that might be an interesting exercise.

It is just a guess - but I bet women get better grades than men in college, athletes or not.