Flickinger's Olympic journey from Spring Grove to Rio
The time crunch is real. Only so many hours remain before the biggest races of Hali Flickinger's life, and Spring Grove's Flickinger knows it. She feels it.
In the rare glimpses of Flickinger on social media at training camp with the U.S. Olympic swim team, she might appear relaxed. She posted pictures next to friends and U.S. Olympic swimmers after landing in Atlanta . Or posing for a picture with the rest of the U.S. Olympic swim team with San Antonio Spurs coach Greg Popovich and Spurs point guard Tony Parker in July in San Antonio. But the pressure is real as the Rio Olympics draw near. Flickinger acknowledges as much. Unable to squeeze in a phone interview, she agreed to answer questions through email.
"As the days continue getting closer to Rio the more I have on my plate," Flickinger wrote. "Plus they are adjusting our sleep due to the late times we swim in Rio, so half of the day I am not going to be awake anyway."
The big day is almost here.
But in a way, the biggest decision of her athletic career happened years ago … while still a senior in high school at Spring Grove.
And some would argue, the most pressure-packed race of her career already happened … when she placed second in the 200-meter butterfly at the U.S. Olympic Team Trials June 30.
Could the biggest surprise of her career still happen in Rio?
• • •
Hali Flickinger was going to be a Texas Longhorn.
She informed the Texas coach of her decision.
Then she told her parents.
But in the days following that decision, she changed her mind.
She realized what she really wanted, and needed, was to swim at the University of Georgia.
Since she had only made a non-binding verbal commitment to Texas, she still had time to fix the problem. On signing day, she went with her heart and signed with Georgia. A decision that paid off as she showed individual improvement and also swam for three national championship teams.
"She could have went to Texas and been the fastest swimmer there her freshman year," her father, Doug Flickinger, said. "But she wanted to go to Georgia, Allison Schmitt was there, Megan Romano, Shannon Vreeland. There were Olympians there. She wanted them to push her and make her better, and that's what set her focus on the Olympics when she stepped foot in Athens, Georgia."
Even though she made the Olympic trials as a teenager swimming for the York YMCA Aquatic Club, the Olympic dream didn't become a possibility until she left home, Flickinger said. There's a big difference between being one of the top 25 swimmers in the country and being one of the top two swimmers in the nation; being in the top 25 will earn a swimmer an invite to the U.S. Olympic trials, but only the top two swimmers earn a spot at the Olympics.
"Not until college did I really realize that I could potentially make the (Olympic) team," Flickinger wrote. "Being around former Olympians and training with them and seeing where I fit in made me see that I had the potential. Don't get me wrong, I thought about the Olympics and dreamed about them since I was little and worked to get better each day when I was at York but the reality hit when I went to Georgia."
So it was fitting that one of the first people she saw after earning a spot on the U.S. Olympic team was Georgia head coach Jack Bauerle.
"As I walked down the stairs from the pool Jack was there to congratulate me," Flickinger wrote. "Jack understood how much making the Olympic team meant to me, and he did everything in his power to make sure each and every day I was making strides to get there. Jack believed 100 percent in me. Even on the days where I struggled to believe in myself, he was there to remind me of what he sees.
"And to be able to hug him and tell him I did it was a moment I will remember forever, and of course my teammates and the whole coaching staff was there in the back with tears in their eyes. It just made me so proud to be part of such a close tight team."
• • •
The difference was striking.
After Cammile Adams held off Flickinger to win the 200-meter butterfly at the U.S. trials, the two hugged while being interviewed by NBC. The mutual admiration seemed genuine.
"Cammile swam at Texas A&M, so they've known each other since then," Hali's mother, Lea Flickinger, said.
But the physical difference in the two swimmers is noticeable. Adams — listed at 5 feet, 8 inches — has a height advantage. She has a greater wingspan. How could Flickinger hope to defeat Adams? How could she hope to break through in preliminaries or semifinals at the Olympics?
Flickinger's former coach, Michael Brooks, points out that despite being smaller than other competitors, Flickinger has a couple things going for her.
"She works her guts out every day, that's a huge help," said Brooks, who coached Flickinger at the York YMCA Aquatic Club from age 11 through 18. "And her technique is better. You watch her under water, her underwater video, and it's practically perfect in every way like Mary Poppins."
To this day, Brooks uses footage of Flickinger to teach butterfly technique to his swimmers.
"You put a huge engine with really good technique, it's a nice combination," he said.
• • •
Doug Flickinger looks up at the steel running across the ceiling at the Graham Aquatic Center, the pool where the York YMCA Aquatic Club trains, the team Hali trained with from age 11 through high school. Pointing at the ceiling, he acknowledges the steel in the building was provided Eisenhart Joist and Deck in Hanover where he works. He laughs, knowing he likely worked on it at his job in steel fabrication.
It's yet another tie to the pool.
Another tie to Spring Grove's Olympian.
There have been some emotional moments in the last few weeks, where Hali Flickinger acknowledged not only what she accomplished but what her family has done for her. And some of those emotions poured out of her after earning a spot on the U.S. Olympic team in June in Omaha, Nebraska.
"Finally after a few hours later I got to see my family," she said about the night she qualified for the Olympics. "The one person I looked to first was my dad, and I immediately start crying as I hugged him. My dad has been there from the very, very beginning. He has sacrificed more than he should have for me to follow my dreams. My dad always knew I could do it, and even if I was pushed down at times my dad was still proud of me."
Flickinger's parents can't stop smiling when asked about their daughter.
"She's on Cloud 10," her mother, Lea Flickinger, said.
A sentiment echoed by her father, who adds and emphasizes one word: "She's still on Cloud 10."
It's an odd place. Flickinger has the everyday concerns of an athlete in training, even though she has secured a spot on the Olympic team and reached one of her biggest goals.
"Training right now is back up to pretty high intensity," Flickinger wrote. "Lifting weights as well, so it is basically back to the grind.
"I am just really looking forward to representing our country and to be able to walk and wear the red, white, and blue."
And yet, there's a sense Flickinger has navigated the most difficult part of this journey.
"I actually think it will be easier for Hali to swim fast at the Olympics than it was at the Olympic trials," Brooks said, "because, although it might sound counterintuitive, there is much more pressure and much more tension at the U.S. Olympic trials than any other meet on the planet. ... When you know they only take two, and you have to do it on a specific day. You've never seen so many elite, national and international athletes mentally come unglued at the U.S. Olympic trials.
"So to be able to swim your best under that kind of pressure is rare and special. Having gone through that, almost everyone who makes the Olympic team says it, if you can handle the Olympic trials the Olympics are a piece of cake."
Her parents relayed a conversation Hali had about that same topic. A coach told her after she had clinched a spot on the Olympic team that no matter what else happens this year or for the rest of her life, no one will be able to take away that one word: Olympian. She will always be an Olympian.
It could be a recipe for the biggest surprise yet: Hali Flickinger swimming free and easy in the biggest race of her life.
"So I can't wait for that 200 butterfly," Brooks said.
Rio Olympics
Opening ceremonies
When: 7 p.m. Friday, Aug. 5
Watch: NBC
Flickinger in Rio
Local Olympian: Spring Grove's Hali Flickinger
Event: women's 200-meter butterfly
200 fly preliminaries: noon, Tuesday, Aug. 9 (NBC)
200 fly semifinals: 9 p.m., Tuesday, Aug. 9 (NBC)
200 fly final: 10 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 10 (NBC)
