Prep swimming: Mahtomedi’s Abby Wright, an eighth grader, a state title contender in several events
Normally, Mahtomedi High School girls swim and dive coach Mike Goldman elects to bring his team’s younger swimmers along at a slower pace. In his six years coaching the team, he has had a handful of middle school swimmers come through the program, almost all of whom need a couple years to come into their own.
“For someone to step in and contribute right away is pretty amazing,” Goldman said. “It makes what Abby is doing pretty special.”
Now in her second year on the team, eighth grader Abby Wright is on the brink of a handful of top finishes at Friday’s Class A state swimming state meet at the University of Minnesota. She set personal bests in the 50 and 100 freestyle races at last week’s Section 4 meet last week, winning both races.
She enters the state finals on Friday as one of the favorites. She swam the fastest section time of any state qualifier in the 100 freestyle and was beaten out by only one swimmer — Adalynn Biegler, a fellow eighth grader from Monticello — in the 50 freestyle.
In Thursday’s state meet prelims, she finished third in the 100 freestyle in 52.63 seconds, fourth in the 50 freestyle in 24.40 and she swam a leg on Mahtomedi’s 400 freestyle relay team, which placed fourth in 3:39.86. She qualified for Friday’s finals in all three events.
Wright finished 12th in the 100 freestyle at last year’s state meet. The 200 and 400 freestyle relay teams each finished 10th a year ago. She credits her improvement this year to a greater sense of belonging with the rest of the team.
“Last year it was kind of intimidating, coming in and being the youngest,” she said, “but I’m a lot closer with everyone now, and that’s helped a lot.”
Goldman can see it too. He has known Wright for about five years, coaching her in club swimming before she became old enough to compete for the high school team. Despite still being one of the youngest girls on the team, her teammates have embraced her, Goldman said. It helps that Wright’s personality has no bit of arrogance, though it probably could because of her talent.
“She’s known more for the type of individual she is than what she is as an athlete,” he said.
Goldman referenced a moment last season when one of the older swimmers broke the school record for the 100 freestyle only for Wright to break it later that year. There was never any emotion from her teammates other than excitement. The team embracing Wright, plus another year of competing for the club team this offseason, has led Goldman to believe Wright is “the most confident I’ve seen her look.”
“She had an idea of what she could do last year and got a taste of it. This year she has a better frame of mind about everything,” Goldman said. “She’s very determined. She never seems to lose her cool. I don’t know if she gets nervous or not, but she never ever shows that.”
She apparently has a good poker face.
“I’m nervous,” she admitted. “But I’m excited, excited to have people to compete against.”
Wright admits she’s quiet, but she has a clear sense of where she wants to go and how she feels about it. Still several years away, she knows she wants to swim in college, preferably for Auburn or Texas Christian University. And she’s grounded in knowing that if success at state doesn’t come this year, there will be plenty more opportunities.
“I’m just going to try my best, and if it doesn’t work out, I have a few more years still,” she said with a laugh.
