Former Gophers swimmer Bowe Becker's year: retire, unretire, make the U.S. Olympic team
Jul. 23—Bowe Becker was ready to be done with swimming, so when the pandemic hit last year, the Gophers alum returned to his hometown of Reno, Nev., and effectively retired. At least for six months.
As a lifelong swimmer, it wasn't long before Becker got the itch to dive back into the pool again. He started to miss it after a few months away, and when he got the opportunity to compete again, Becker knew he had to give it everything he had.
"I got a second chance to swim, so I took it and went back to Minnesota, and had about nine months to train," Becker said. "I told myself if I was going to do it, it had to be all or nothing. I gave it everything I had and somehow made it."
What exactly did he make? Nothing special. Just the Summer Olympics in Tokyo. He will swim in the 4×100-meter freestyle relay early Sunday morning as a part of Team USA.
If it sounds a little unbelievable on the surface, Becker feels the exact same way. As he so succinctly put it, "You don't take six months off from a sport and then come back and try to make the Olympic team. It doesn't work like that."
Apparently it does for the 24-year-old Becker. While he was excited to be done with the sport at first, Becker acknowledged that a lot of those feelings were rooted in burnout. He wasn't having fun with the sport a year ago — and that started to carry over into other aspects of his life.
"The previous year before COVID I was living by myself and not getting out much," he said. "It was basically swim, swim, swim, sleep, then swim, swim, swim, sleep. On repeat. I didn't really have much of a personal life. I was able to live with friends last year, and that helped quite a bit. After I had those six months away, I was in a much better place. That was a big part of it."
In addition to training in Minnesota for a prolonged period of time last year, Becker also got a chance to compete for the Cali Condors of the International Swimming League (ISL). He remembers Condors general manager Jason Lezak, a former Olympian, calling him out of the blue and asking if he wanted to compete.
"Basically, the Australian government didn't allow the Australians to leave the country during COVID," Becker explained. "That left some swimmers out so (Lezak) called me and asked me if I was in shape to swim. Even though I hadn't been swimming, I kind of lied and said, 'Yeah, I'm ready.' I don't know. That's kind of how it happened."
That allowed Becker to compete on an international stage in Budapest, Hungary, for five weeks last year before returning to Minnesota to train for the Olympics. He qualified at the U.S. Olympic Trials in Omaha, Neb., in June.
"It's awesome," Becker said. "It's a feeling I can't really express with words alone."
Asked how he was approaching the Olympics as a whole, Becker said he planned to soak in the moment as much as possible.
"I was talking to a lot of the older guys and they have been saying it's going to hit us when we get into the village and all the other teams are kind of staring at us like, 'Oh, that's Team USA,' " Becker said. "We're the guys to beat in swimming. We're the big dog, and everyone wants to beat us. They told us to be ready for that."
That shouldn't be a problem. After the year that Becker has had — retiring, unretiring, then making the Olympic team — he's ready for just about anything.
