Alkhaldi to focus on strength training

LONDON – Fil-Saudi Arabian swimmer Jasmine Alkhaldi wasn’t too disappointed in finishing 34th of 50 in the women’s 100-meter freestyle event and gave herself a rating of 8 1/2 on a scale of 1 to 10 in her Olympic debut at the Aquatics Center here last Wednesday.          

“I’m happy about it,” said the 19-year-old charmer who just completed her freshman year at the University of Hawaii as an athlete scholar. “I was fifth of eight in my heat. At the halfway mark of 50 meters, my time was 27.96 seconds. It was slower than my usual since I’ve done 27.1 before but I was hoping to finish stronger. I got tired in the last 15 meters. That’s when my arms and legs got heavy. I tried to push harder. I really did my best. I think it was one of my best swims, maybe second only to when I did my personal best.”

Alkhaldi qualified for the Olympics with a clocking of 56.92. She was timed at 57.13 here, outpacing American Samoa’s Megan Fonteno, Bolivia’s Karen Milenka Torrez Guzman and San Marino’s Clelia Tini. Seven of 50 swimmers clocked over a minute and two were scratched from the start list.

Just before plunging into the pool at the starting block, Alkhaldi said her right leg began to shake. “It was my first Olympics and I was really nervous,” she admitted. “Imagine, I was competing against the best in the world. As I waited for the start, I noticed my right leg was shaking. I asked myself why am I shaking? I told myself to settle down. It’s not easy. To be in the Olympics is already quite an achievement but I wanted to do more than just participate. I wanted to do better than my personal best.”

Alkhaldi said she’ll learn from the experience. “Even the Olympic record holder (Germany’s Britta Steffen) didn’t match her personal best,” she pointed out. “That’s how it is in swimming. Sometimes, you do better than your best. Other times, you don’t. But you keep trying to improve with lots of hard work and training.”

Steffen set the Olympic record of 53.16 in the 100-meter freestyle in Beijing four years ago. But at the Aquatics Center, Steffen placed only 14th with a time of 54.42. China’s Tang Yi swam away with the gold medal, clocking 53.28. Steffen holds the world record of 52.07 set in Italy in 2009.

“Strength makes a difference in swimming,” said Alkhaldi. “Dr. Todd (Reiter) examined me here and found a weakness in my shoulder, specifically the bone under the scapula. He wants me to work on it to make me stronger. At the University of Hawaii, we do a lot of dry-land training, like lifting weights which I never did before in the Philippines. Since I’m only 19, I know I can get stronger. My goal is to increase my power which is key in a short course. Now that I’m of age, I know I can build on this experience to improve. I want to swim in the next Olympics when I’ll be 23.”

Alkhaldi said she plans to finish her marketing and international business studies in Hawaii. “My timetable is only up to the next Olympics in 2016 then I’ll take it from there,” she said. “I could continue swimming or I could do something else. I could live abroad or go back to the Philippines. I still don’t know what will happen that far into the future.”

Alkhaldi, the middle of three children, said when her Saudi Arabian father Mohammed left Manila, she never reconnected. “I was only five or six when my father left,” she said. “My older sister Sarah communicated with him because she wanted to study in the US. My father paid for her education in Oklahoma. When Sarah was in Oklahoma, my father went there for cancer treatment. That was when they saw each other again. My father died two years ago. I really don’t know how many half-brothers and half-sisters we have in Saudi.”

Alkhaldi’s sister Sarah, 22, works for CNBC in Singapore. Her brother Fahad, 17, is with the Philippine national training pool. Mother Susan Paler lives in Parañaque and operates a catering service.

Now that her Olympic campaign is over, Alkhaldi said she’ll go all out to support the Filipino athletes still in contention. “I’ll watch all the swimming events with coach Pinky (Brosas) and Jessie (Khing Lacuna) and learn from the best,” she said. “When there’s time, I’ll want to see the sights in London. But my priority at the moment is to support my Filipino teammates. Another thing I want to do is to meet American swimmer Natalie Coughlin whose grandmother is Filipina. I met Natalie’s mother who is half-Filipina in the World Championships before and we had a picture taken together. I emailed the picture to Natalie but she never replied. I’m sure she got it, though. Natalie’s my idol. So I’m hoping to be able to speak with her, get a picture and autograph. She’s always in the stands with athletes during the swimming events so I’m hoping to catch her before the end of the swimming events.”