Goals were made to be written in pencil.

At least for a trio of Sudbury Laurentian Swim Club representatives last month, that seemed to be the case.

“At the beginning of the year, my goal wasn’t even to qualify for OSCs (Ontario Swimming Championships),” noted 14 year-old Brooke Herranen, who joined teammates James Ford and Ewan Duncan in competing at the event for a very first time earlier this month in Toronto.

And much to the delight of head coach Dean Henze, all three advanced to a final, earning a second swim. It’s an encouraging wave of talent coming in behind the likes of Alexandre Landry and James Bertrim, that pair closing off the SLSC season by attending nationals later this month.

And it’s a younger wave of talent that keeps raising the bar – even if somewhat unexpectedly so at times.

“It was surprising,” suggested Ewan Duncan. “We weren’t planning on it (being at OSCs) but then my friend James (Ford) qualified and I didn’t want him to go alone, so I put my head down and tried to qualify in my last race.”

Both Duncan and Herranen would hit their required standards at the 2024 Summer Ontario Youth-Junior Championships (OYJs) in June, that meet being the early season goal that was shared within this troika, with Ford clocking his time just one meet earlier.

This constitutes a very nice wrap to the 2023-2024 season for these local swimmers, some of whom can thank a family love of water for their start in the sport. “My dad signed me up to a tryout that they had and it was really fun,” recalled Duncan, one of two young pool practitioners with SLSC, with younger brother Callum also at practice at R.G Dow Pool on Friday.

“My dad swam competitively (Kanata / Nepean) and I think he just wanted me to try it out.”

And while the entire male side of this particular Duncan clan clearly enjoy an affinity for the water, there are some distinctions to each and every athlete. “Dad liked the breaststroke, just like my brother, but I like to swim the backstroke,” said Ewan. “I just really like it – but it’s also based somewhat on what races the coaches put you in.”

“Depending on how you do, they will keep putting you in those races – if you are fast and they notice that you like it.”

Like most competitive swimmers, Ewan Duncan likes his favourite event “most” of the time – when things are going well, if you will.

“Every race, I try my best to take time off, even if it’s just a little,” he said. “If I don’t take time off, right after my race, before I even get out of the water, I’ll think about what I did wrong that race and how can I improve.”

“I also try and remember that swimming is for fun, not to get too discouraged,” Duncan continued. “If I have a bad race, I am probably upset about it for 20 minutes at most. Then I change my mindset and get ready for the next race.”

Brooke Herranen shares a similar mental resilience. In her particular case, it helps her excel in a stroke that so many swimmers would prefer to avoid.

“I thought I was a breaststroker at the beginning of the year – and then I kind of started really enjoying butterfly more and training it,” noted the Lo-Ellen Park Secondary School junior. “I don’t like training it, but I like racing it.”

In fact, it was in the 100m butterfly that Herranen qualified for the all-Ontario summer meet, thanks in large part to her willingness to fight through the grind. “It’s honestly quite mental,” said the eldest of two children in the family, her father a one-time lifeguard who taught her to swim at her grandparents pool.

“The stroke sucks so you just have to kind of forget how much it hurts.”

Truth be told, Herranen counts herself among the multitude of swimmers that prefers to keep her mind relatively clear by the time the starting gun sounds. “I honestly just kind of blackout during a race,” said the Saskatchewan born teen who did water polo and triathlons for fun as a youth out west, migrating to competitive swimming when she moved to Sudbury at the age of nine.

“I pick maybe two things to focus on (during a race) – but other than that, it’s all muscle memory.”

Ranked 11th entering her feature event and with the top ten moving on to the finals at the Toronto Pan-Am Sports Centre, Herranen was ready to compete. “I knew that it was going to have to be a really good swim,” she said. “I feel like I paced it really, really well. I felt like I wasn’t dying by the end, but I didn’t go out too slow.”

“The pacing was kind of perfect that race.”

And with that competition behind them, the SLSC duo can ease away from swimming until practices resume in September – though they don’t.

“I don’t boycott the water,” said Duncan. “I really like to swim, even outside our season.”

In his case, this means heading to a friend’s cottage with a swim to the point some 200 metres away constituting a there and back outing every day they can.

Herranen, by contrast, remains indoors, jumping in with the seniors and such that partake in early morning lane swimming at the Dow.

“I try and do one hard practice a week – but the rest of them, I am just going to go because it’s fun,” she said. “Last year, I did lane swims three times a week during the summer – and I am usually the youngest one there – by quite a bit.”

And when that is done, it will be time to set her goals for 2024-2025 – only to likely reset them all over again five to six months later.

And that’s not a bad thing at all.