Everywhere Josh Bottelberghe turned, there another Olympian stood, sat, or swam a mere feet from the teen.
Then, of course, were the conversations the Columbia River High School senior overheard last summer competing in the same venue as some of the world’s top swimmers.
“I saw Ryan Murphy coming back to talk to Nathan Adrian about why Jacob Pebley wasn’t going to swim a certain race,” Bottelberghe said. “… I’m like, ‘alright, this is pretty cool.’”
It was an experience of a lifetime at last summer’s Phillips 66 National Championships in Indianapolis, a meet Bottelberghe, a three-time state champion and 2A meet-record holder in three events, was poolside – and even in the pool — with some of the household names of the swimming world. He shared the warm-up pool with two-time Olympic silver medalist Cullen Jones and Bottelberghe swam the 100- and 200-meter breaststrokes not long after breaststroker Lily King, a gold medalist in the Rio Olympics, did so in the women’s races.
And the kicker came when Bottelberghe came within feet of the man whose high school state record he’s chasing this weekend at the state swimming championships.
It’s Adrian, the 2012 Olympic Gold medalist in the 50 freestyle who, as a senior at Bremerton High in 2006, set the all-classification 200 free state record of 1 minute, 37.17 seconds.
Breaking a future Olympic gold medalist’s state record would be the perfect closure to an illustrious prep swimming career for the Notre Dame-bound swimmer, Bottelberghe said last week. This weekend will be
the senior’s final high school swim meet at Federal Way’s King County Aquatic Center on Friday and Saturday.
“That would be fantastic,” said Bottelberghe, the defending 2A 200 freestyle and 100 breaststroke state champion who also has Friday’s top preliminary times in both events. “It’s Nathan Adrian.”
Prepping for and competing at winter nationals in Columbus, Ohio, in December with his club team, Portland Aquatic Club, meant a later start to Bottelberghe’s senior season of high school swimming. His first prep meet came in January, but swimming a personal-best 1:39.87 to win the 2A title last Feburary — his second of the meet — in a meet-record time is what’s driving since that day.
That and wanting to bring home a first-ever first-place team trophy for Columbia River boys swimming with almost twice as many numbers as last year’s team that finished fourth at state.
“I want to see what we can do,” he said.
Last year, Bottelberghe became just the sixth swimmer across all classifications since 2012 to swim a sub-1:40 in the 200 free, and he knows it’ll take a monumental effort to shed more than 2 seconds off
to achieve the ultimate feat.
It starts, he said, by hitting certain pace times in practice.
“I know what pace it’s going to take for me to get that record,” he said. “…. Oh my gosh, it’s going to hurt really badly, but I think I can do it. I think I have a shot.”
River coach Alyssa Manlow, in her sixth season coaching the boys team, knows first hand what it’ll take, too. In her prep days at Heritage, she won state titles in the 100 and 200 freestyles in the mid-2000s and said as swimmers mature and reach maximum speed for a race, the smaller their gap is for time improvement.
But if anyone can do it, Bottelberghe has the best shot.
“The way that Josh trains and races,” Manlow said, “I think it’s very doable. He has such a good, relaxed attitude about racing that’s served him well.
“That’s definitely within his reach.”
