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Karlyn Pipes, one of the world’s most celebrated swimmers, is in Bahrain this week coaching and offering top tips to sports enthusiasts of all ages.
She is a guest of the Bahrain Triathlon Club (BTC) and has been busy holding clinics at the pools at Bahrain Rugby Football Club and St Christopher’s School and in the sea around the Four Seasons Hotel Bahrain Bay, with another one planned for Hamala.
The American swimming legend now travels the world teaching swimmers and triathletes of all ages and abilities how to ‘swim faster with less effort’ at her swim technique clinics and camps.
She admits, now aged 52, with numerous championships and world records to her credit, she has nothing left to prove as a competitor, but plenty still to accomplish.
“It’s about giving back, it’s about recognising the people who have helped you along the way and then maybe being in a position where you can do the same, where you can inspire and create hope,” she said.
Pipes said she had found Bahrain ‘friendly, warm and open’ and was ‘impressed’ with the level of interest in her swim clinics. She has already held two freestyle clinics with 20 triathletes aged between 30 and 60-plus and 15 athletes also enjoyed a 2km salt water swim in Bahrain Bay. One dived in for the first time in open water and another succeeded in swimming more than 700m as Pipes gave him the confidence to go straight to 2km.
She is one of the world’s most decorated competitors who was recently named one of the Top 10 Masters swimmers of all time by Swimming World Magazine and was recognised as the ‘World Masters Swimmer of the Year’ on five occasions. She has also set over 200 FINA world Masters records in both pool and open water, 47 of which are still current. Masters is a special class of competitive swimming for those 25 and older.
She moved to Hawaii and opened a swim instruction company called Aquatic Edge. Pipes’ company now hosts more than 50 swimming clinics throughout the globe every year.
“We feel very lucky to have her with us in Bahrain,” a BTC spokesman told GulfWeekly and revealed that the visit was made possible thanks to an anonymous benefactor whose sole aim was to ‘invest in the growing passion for swimming and triathlon as well as health in Bahrain’.
“Karlyn has brought her strength, knowledge, passion, enthusiasm as well as sharing her love of swimming,” the spokesman added.
“She has run a freestyle swimming clinic for the Bahrain-based triathletes and swimmers at the Rugby Club and St Christopher’s School. She will also host an open water swim clinic to train the triathletes for the coming Challenge Bahrain and Ironman Middle East Bahrain. St Christopher’s School swim squad students will be privileged to welcome this wonderful coach too at a multi-stroke clinic.
“Between her private sessions and group sessions and the school visits, Karlyn has not stopped since she’s been on the island. She has had a very busy schedule!”
Pipes arrived in Bahrain on September 14 and will be here until this coming Sunday. She has already held an open water clinic at the Four Seasons and will stage another at Bahrain Bay on Friday.
She will be running a clinic for the St Christopher’s school squad today from 9.30am-4pm and another shortly before she leaves the island. The training will be divided in three separate age groups and organisers are expecting a very high turnout of students as there are 110 in the squad. Another open water clinic will be held on Friday at Al Hamala Resort from 8am-11am, thanks to the support of Shaikh Ebrahim Al Khalifa, the BTC said.
Pipes learned to swim at the age of four and competed in her first race at six. She even tackled open water swimming before she was 10. By the time she was 15, she was a junior national champion. But Pipes did not really come into her own until she became a Masters swimmer. Ever her own woman, she did it her way: backwards. She got faster as she got older!
Pipes’ arrival could not be better timed for local sportsmen and women as the kingdom prepares to stage its two major sporting spectaculars – Challenge Bahrain on November 30 and the Ironman event on December 5.
Pipes is a great believer in ‘do-overs’, her term for dealing with daily challenges. She explained: “I am hoping to inspire other people that do-overs don’t need to be extreme life makeovers, but that they can be a minute-to-minute, day-to-day change in how you think about something, a change in attitude, change in perception, or even your next swimming stroke,” Pipes said. “Every morning the sun comes up, we have a chance to do something over.”
The BTC said it would like to thank BRFC, St Chris, Al Hamala Beach Resort and Four Seasons for the use of their facilities during the swimming clinics, alongside the triathlon shop Trilife for the support shown in welcoming Pipes.
BTC started out as an informal group of professional male and female workers, stay-at-home mums and children who collectively have a common love for and desire to play sport … and more specifically triathlon.
“Most of our members have played sport when younger at a regional or international level, for example, rugby, football and hockey, or have other related interests such as running and swimming. We are self-funded through member contributions,” explained Allan Sword, BTC’s treasurer. Conceived by Toby Leyland, BTC commenced in 2011 as an online forum for established and new triathletes, informing them of training sessions for the three disciplines in and around Bahrain.
* The Hamala open water clinic costs BD30 and for more details email pereiraom@hotmail.com
