joshua's first IM

an IM is not easy.
{LAST swim team post. i promise!}

in an IM, you swim butterfly, then backstroke, then breast stroke, then freestyle. 100 meters.

joshua's age group swims 25 meters for their races. not even 50 meters (rebekah's age group swims 50 meters.)

he's mentioned off and on during the season maybe wanting to try an IM. {the age group for an IM starts at "10 and under" - not that many 8 year olds even try it.}

whenever we would go to the pool just to play, he would spend at least half the time "practicing" an IM...to see if he could do it.

each week, when i signed the kids up for the strokes they would swim in the next meet, i would ask him if he wanted to do an IM and he always said, "no. not yet."

fine.

but when i signed him up for this last meet, he said he wanted to do it. alrighty!

here he is before the start (he's the middle one)

he looked GREAT doing butterfly! really strong.

AWESOME in backstroke {remember, that's HIS stroke}

then he turned to start breast stroke and grabbed the lane line. my heart dropped to my FEET. for him to grab the lane line, i knew he was DYING. and my heart just wanted to jump in the water and breath for him!

but he let go and kept going. he pushed through. finished breast stroke...

finished freestyle. {i stopped taking pictures. i was just watching my boy SWIM!} finished an IM. all the coaches and kids {and spectators!} were cheering for him. it was awesome. he got out of the pool crying. he had NO breath. the kid put everything into butterfly and backstroke and couldn't breath anymore. it was a HUGE stretch for him, and he stuck through and DID it! we were SO SO proud of him!