Paris Open Water Prep Differs for Mariah Denigan, Katie Grimes
Mariah Denigan likes to joke with her teammates that the 1500 freestyle in the pool feels like a sprint. She omitted, perhaps strategically, her teammates’ response to that.
But when it came to U.S. Olympic Trials in Indianapolis last month, Denigan’s regard for the speed of the longest pool event colored her preparation, which for the open water swimmer will differ sharply from her pool brethren as the Paris Olympics arrive.
“I definitely don’t go as low as some sprinters obviously or even some pool distance swimmers in yardage,” Denigan said at Lucas Oil Stadium, after finishing seventh in prelims of the women’s 1500 on the way to eighth in the final. “I definitely just bring down the intensity and still try to keep my volume a little higher. So like on a race week, it’d be like 6k, 5k, 4k by day, so drop a thousand. And then the day before the race only doing like a 1500.
“So day before the 10k race is always really fun for me because I get to just sit around and do nothing.”
U.S. open water Olympians, from left, Katie Grimes, Ivan Puskovitch and Mariah Denigan; Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick
That’ll be Aug. 8, when Denigan and fellow American Katie Grimes are among 24 women who will chase medals in the 10-kilometer, scheduled to be held in the River Seine (or, if water conditions don’t improve, the Vaires-sur-Marne Nautical Stadium).
The preparation for each will differ slightly, thanks to the uniqueness of their journeys.
Despite a solid performance in Indy, open water is the only event Denigan will contest in Paris, which streamlines the preparation. She trained through Indy, and her plan is to keep the yardage high. Taper for open water isn’t like taper for the pool, and not just when it comes to volume.
Part of that, says Denigan, owes to the particular mental challenges of open-water competition.
“A lot of it is just how strong can I be mentally? And that’s how open water is,” she said. “You have to be tougher than the people around you. So I feel like that’s where my strengths lie within the sport.”
Denigan, 21, is in her first Olympics. The native of Ohio who trains at Indiana University qualified via the 2024 World Aquatics Championships in Doha, where she placed eighth, a jump from 15th in Fukuoka the summer before.
Part of her preparation includes time in a body of water, Indiana’s Lake Lemon. That was one of the venues where Indiana swimmers could train with social distancing while pools remained closed in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, and it’s an asset Denigan still uses to her advantage, once water temperatures warm sufficiently by the middle of the spring.
“I feel like my coaches are probably the best in the country of focusing on open water training and letting me train open water while also focusing on (things like) Anna Pep (Peplowski) doing the 2-free,” she said. “So they do a really good job of balancing whatever the individual needs, and that’s why I love it at IU.”
Grimes’ preparation is by necessity different. In her second Olympics at age 18, she’s both younger and more experienced than Denigan. She also has the distinction of the first American woman to qualify in the pool and open water at the same Olympics, Grimes sealing the latter with a bronze medal in the 10K at the 2023 World Championships.
Grimes’ schedule in Paris will be busy. She qualified in the 400 individual medley, contested July 29, and the women’s 1500 free, with heats on July 30 and a July 31 final. She then gets a week to prepare for open water.
Grimes also swam the 200 backstroke and 400 free at Trials before scratching out of finals in both. She finished eighth in the 200 free.
Grimes’ experience with the pool/open water double is growing. In Fukuoka, she swam open water first, then nine days later contested the 1500 free, in which she admits she “got wrecked,” finishing a distant eighth. She recovered five days later to win a silver medal in the 400 IM.
At the 2022 World Championships in Budapest, Grimes took silver the 400 IM and the 1500 free before finishing fifth in the open water, a schedule which mimics Paris and is her clear preference.
“I definitely prefer open water after just because, I saw in Fukuoka, I got wrecked in the 1,500,” she said. “I definitely like to just focus on my pool events first.”
In terms of training, though, there’s little to tweak. Her work with at Sandpipers of Nevada with coach Ron Aitken, the open water head coach for Paris, is geared around heavy distance and IM sets. They’ll tweak the stroke sets before the IM and manage volume for the 1500 before a brief ramp-up for open water.
“It’s going to be different for sure,” she said. “But we had this same lineup in Budapest where we swam the pool that’s prior – the 1500 and the 400 IM, and then I have the 10K a few days after that. We’ve done it before and we’ve gotten all the hard work out of the way. So we know that if I just try to keep my endurance up, keep my strength up, I’ll be good.”
