When an athlete is at their peak performance during competition, they are usually breathing heavy and fast to get as much oxygen as possible to their lungs. A swimmer, on the other hand, doesn’t always have this luxury of breathing. “In the shorter freestyle races, I try to breathe as little as possible so I don’t slow down,” Cannon Falls’ Lindy Edstrom reveals. “In the breaststroke and backstroke, I breathe every time I do a pull and the butterfly is the most difficult to not breathe on.”

In 2009, the Northfield Bullsharks Swim Club gained a phenomenal swimmer. At the age of 8, Lindy Edstrom stroked her way into competitive swimming and never looked back. Her motivation to keep swimming is the feeling she gets after “looking up at the scoreboard and seeing a lifetime best.” Teammates also play a major role in her life because they are encouraging during hard sets at practice.

There are about 50 swim clubs in Minnesota that can range from 80 swimmers to 400. The Northfield Bullsharks Swim Club competes against various clubs across the area such as the Rochester Orcas, Riptide Swim Team, and the South Metro Storm Swim Club. These are located in towns like St. Croix, Apple Valley, St. Paul, Rochester, Hastings, and Lake Superior. At the state and regional championships, the bigger swim clubs are in Class AA and the smaller clubs, like Northfield, are in Class A for team points, but the Northfield Bullsharks still race Class AA swimmers. When asked what she thinks about during a race Lindy replied, “I am very competitive so I am focused on getting 1st, but I try not to think about anything that doesn’t have to do with my race, so I can be focused on doing as best I can.”

In competitive swimming, there are a total of four different swimming strokes: freestyle, backstroke, breaststroke, and butterfly. A combination of all four strokes is called an individual medley and in freestyle events, the competitor is permitted to swim any stroke. Out of these four strokes, Lindy mentions that the breaststroke is undoubtedly her favorite. Normally, the high school sophomore will compete in the 100 yard breaststroke, with a personal best of 1:08.61, and in the 200 yard breaststroke, with a personal best of 2:42.91.

With all of these personal bests, Lindy was able to secure a spot at the 2017 MN Senior Short Course State Championships which took place on Thursday, March 9th, and concluded on Sunday, March 12th. Although she qualified in three total events, she competed in the 100 yard breaststroke on Friday and decided miss her other two events, the 50 Free and the 100 Individual Medley, that took place on Saturday. In the 100 yard breaststroke, Lindy was seeded 34th out of 44 in the 15-18 year old state qualifiers group. In heat 2 of 6 in lane 5, she won her heat and got under 1:10 for the first time. Excitement bubbled inside Lindy when she found out that she made it back to State finals later in the day. Now ranked 18th, she was in lane 5 again and had executed the best race of her swimming career. Overall, she captured 13th place by winning her heat and dropping another second from that morning.

During the spring, Lindy hangs up her cap and goggles near her breathtaking wall of swimming awards and takes a well-deserved break from swimming. This well-deserved break, however, is occupied by Speech and Track. In Speech, Lindy speaks in the OO (persuasive) category, while in Track, she sprints in the 100 meter and 200 meter dash. Her next swim meet isn’t until mid-June in the town of Alexandria, MN, which is roughly three hours away. Although swimming is not available as an extracurricular activity at Cannon Falls, that doesn’t stop Lindy Edstrom from being submerged in water. With perseverance and mental toughness, Lindy has overcome many obstacles to become one of the best swimmers in the state of Minnesota.

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Jean Edstrom

Lindy Edstrom dives into the water in a recent meet