Thank You Malachi Cunningham

As I prepare for my swim down the Hudson tomorrow from the George Washington Bridge to the Verrazano Bridge, I have my feet up, water bottle in hand to hydrate and am thinking exactly how I got here. As most of my close friends know, I was a breastroker in College. While I did swim division I, I was not the stand out star on my team. I always worked hard at practice and tried my best. Glimmers of standout swims sprinkled my college career but I felt most comfortable at practice, when the race pads were lifted and I could just swim whatever my coach wrote on the dryboard. My college coach, Malachi Cunningham, always said to me after a grueling practice, “man you are an athlete.” And I’d stomp my feet, get red faced and say, “i’m a swimmer, why don’t you ever say I’m a swimmer, that is what I do.” Because I had heard him say that to other teammates. It took me a long time to realize what he meant. I worked my ass off every practice, sometimes leading the lane but at meets, those same teammates that swam behind me would blow me away. There are swimmers who can mess around or take it easy at practice and get into a race and then rock it, while others, like myself, have to work really hard to preform well. Malachi always believed in me even when I didn’t believe in myself. He pushed me but left me loving every bit of the painful practices and division I swimming experience. He never gave me less attention because I was the second string breastroker and he never let me feel sorry for myself when my races failed my training. He stood by me and got me help when I battled with an eating disorder my Junior year. I was never alone with him by my side as a coach and father figure. So, as I sit on the couch and relfect on how I got to this spot, a distance swimmer – of course, that is what I should have been doing in college – I have to think back and smile on the memories of Malachi on deck and me in the water looking up at him hanging on to every encouraging word coming out of his mouth.