Brent Hayden learning to live in and out of the pool
Iain MacIntyre, Vancouver Sun columnist
Published: Wednesday, May 23, 2012VANCOUVER – It is still three months until Brent Hayden’s wedding but already he is a changed man.
The swimmer from Mission no longer gets nervous on his own before races. He has his fiancee’s name tattooed on the ring finger of his left hand. And, most shockingly, the 28-year-old actually looks forward to going home after workouts to enthusiastically study flower arrangements, discuss seating charts, choose colours and test-fold napkins. No wonder he has a Superman tattoo on his chest.
“The wedding planning has been a pleasant distraction,” Hayden said Thursday at the University of B.C., where the Mel Zajac International Swim Meets starts today. “Training is very hard and can be mentally exhausting, and sometimes it’s nice to go home and look at flower arrangements or who is going to sit at what table or work on the guest book. It’s been nice and it’s been fun and it gives me something else to look forward to this summer. I can’t go into this summer without a smile on my face.”
Canada Olympic swimmer Brent Hayden speaks to the media at the UBC Aquatic Centre in Vancouver on Thursday.
And since his wedding to Nadina Zarifeh, a Lebanese-Canadian pop singer, outside Beirut in August is the week after the London Olympics, Hayden can’t help but leave the summer smiling, too.
That was impossible for him to do after the Olympics in 2008 and 2004.
Eight years ago, Hayden was beat up, literally, when his disappointing performance in the pool was nothing like the nightmare he encountered in the streets of Athens when he emerged late a night from a bar and found himself in the middle of a riot. Greek police used their batons on protesters and Hayden, young enough to fit the profile, suffered an elbow injury serious enough to force him out of the short-course world championships that fall.
Four years ago in Beijing, it was the media that came out swinging when Hayden, the reigning world champion in the 100-metres freestyle, failed to make the Olympic final.
It is athletics’ great injustices that world-class Canadians get more attention and scorn for failing at Olympics than they receive praise and support for success in the three years between Games.
In 2007, Hayden became the first Canadian since Victor Davis in 1986 to win a world championship when he tied for first in the 100 free. Although he missed a medal by 2/100ths of a second at the 2009 world championships, Hayden set a Canadian record of 47.27 seconds over 100 metres.
He won the Commonwealth Games title in 2010, then won silver at the 2011 worlds.
Hayden is without doubt one of the greatest Canadian swimmers of the last 20 years, but outside the pool crowd he is known mostly for his Olympic disappointments.
“It’s kind of an unfortunate reality, but I’ve learned to live with it,” Hayden said Thursday. “If anything, Beijing solidified my desire to go for another four years because I really did want to make up for that disappointing semi-final. I think the only time where I actually ever thought about quitting was after Athens. That was a lot harder to get over because first I had the poor performances, then I got beat up by the riot police because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. If I can overcome that, I can overcome anything.”
Heading into the Zajac meet, which launches the final stretch of Olympic preparation for Hayden and a handful of other Canadian swimmers, what he needs to overcome is a disparity in times this season against reigning world champion James Magnussen. The 21-year-old Australian’s time of 47.1 seconds in March was one of the fourth fastest 100 metres ever, far quicker than the 48.53 Hayden posted later that month to qualify for London.
“Brent is as good as he’s ever been right now, as strong as he’s ever been,” UBC coach Tom Johnson said. “He’s kind of like a Kentucky Derby horse we haven’t raced very much. We’ve just done a gradual buildup and a block of work, the biggest block we’ve ever done.
“So now we’re going to do this meet and three meets in Europe and that will be the real measure of our preparation. Since 2006, he has been in the top four every year. He was No. 1 in the world in 2010 and No. 2 in 2011. So he’s a threat.
“Magnussen is very good at what he’s doing and is a new guy on the horizon. But he still has to do an Olympics and an Olympics is different than a world championship.”
Hayden said he has learned from his Olympic mistake in 2008, when he underestimated what was needed in the 100 semi-final because the swimmer had his mind on the 4×100 relay.
He clocked 48.20 and finished 11th, then swam 47.56 in the opening relay led for Canada, which finished sixth. That second time, had Hayden done it in the 100 freestyle, would have earned an Olympic bronze medal.
“That was really saddening, knowing I had it in me but I didn’t do it,” he said. “At the same time, I learned a lot about myself. It was a really big growing opportunity.”
So was the 2011 world championships, when Hayden didn’t feel particularly fast going in. He also felt disconcertingly calm before his heat and semi-final in the 100, lacking the usual nervousness that tells him his body is ready for competition.
He said it was only when he saw a television closeup of Nadina in the stands in Shanghai while Brent was waiting to enter the pool deck for the 100 final, did his competitive nerves spark. Then Hayden swam 47.95, behind only Magnussen’s 47.63.
Before she was a singer, Nadina was a swimmer, too, at UBC. Her family had moved to Canada in the 1980s to escape war in Lebanon. In 2009, a friend asked if she knew this guy Hayden who had beaten Olympic superstar Michael Phelps at a meet in Santa Clara. Hayden and Zarifeh became Facebook friends, then much more.
Asked if his career will be defined by what may be his final Olympics, Hayden said: “I haven’t really given that any thought. I see myself as somebody who is committed and always dreams big and is going to do whatever it takes to achieve those dreams. That’s how I see myself.
“Being involved in this sport and going to the Olympics, I’m just having the time of my life, win or lose. It’s been a wonderful ride and we’ll see where it goes from here.”
To London, then Lebanon, and after that who knows?
