Built to swim
At 6 feet 5, Palm Harbor U.'s Tyler Reed has the frame to rule the pool, with a long wingspan and powerful feet that help him surpass opponents.
By BOB PUTNAM
Published September 19, 2006
PALM HARBOR - Tyler Reed is on the pool deck stretching and twisting like a contortionist. He is all arms and legs and protruding ribs.
Nothing about him other than his height, 6 feet, 5 inches, merits a second look or suggests he is anything but a big kid still growing into his frame.
Then the Palm Harbor University High sophomore starts swimming, turning lap after lap. His freestyle stroke is smooth and effortless, long arms slipping slowly, quietly into the water. Each of his strokes is an enormous stride, a feast of yardage.
"He is built to swim," coach Lisa Bitting said.
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Reed has the same physique as some of the great Olympians - Michael Phelps (6-4), Ian Thorpe (6-4), Tom Dolan (6-6) and Michael Gross (6-7). They have chiseled their bodies into a V-shape. Their shoulders and chests are broad. In the water, their assets are manifold: flexibility, quick hands and feet, tremendous kicking power.
This presents problems for opponents. Phelps, Thorpe, Dolan and Gross need fewer strokes than the average swimmer to cover a 50-meter pool. And in a sport that measures time in hundredths of a second, where the difference between gold and silver can be the blink of an eye, their long arms help them touch the wall before others at the end of a race.
Together, the four have won a combined 16 Olympic gold medals.
This breed of swimmer is beginning to cast a shadow over the sport's far-reaching landscape. Now, everyone is panting over long, lanky swimmers because they believe that, indeed, bigger is better.
"When you get to the elite level, everyone has that prototypical body type," Jesuit coach Bill Shafer said. "They're all tall, and they're great athletes."
In 21 years of coaching, including 10 at Jesuit, Shafer has found that height and success go hand in hand. Kris Wiebeck (6-5) was an eight-time All-American with the Tigers from 1997-2000 and went on to swim for Florida. Tommy Wyher (6-4) currently swims for Jesuit and has won five individual state titles.
Reed is cut from the same mold. His stroke is a steady, powerful churn. His size 13 feet act as turbocharged flippers that propel him through the water. At the walls, he pushes off and disappears underwater, re-emerging more quickly than anyone thought possible.
"He is the type of athlete that doesn't come along that often," said Bitting, who has never had a swimmer taller than 6-foot-1 in her 15 years of coaching (10 at PHU).
"He has everything you're looking for, and he is going to be really good."
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Reed was drawn to swimming at an early age. He started in summer recreational leagues when he was 6.
"Back then, it was just for fun," Reed said.
Bitting often would see Reed at summer meets. He already was taller than the other boys, standing 6 feet in the sixth grade.
The coach knew he would only grow and get better.
When Bitting found out Reed was coming to Palm Harbor University, she sat down with his parents, Laura and Jim, to discuss his unlimited potential. She said Reed should start practicing year-round with a club, alongside swimmers as old as 18, every day.
Follow the plan, Bitting told them, and Reed would become a national-level swimmer by the time he finished high school.
The Reeds were incredulous. How could this coach possibly project so far into the future?
Bitting's timetable turned out to be way off.
Instead of attending the state meet as a spectator last season, Reed swam with a relay team in the preliminaries. Bitting made the move so he could get a feel for the experience.
Reed required more than a lean, long build to become a top-level swimmer. He needed the mindset to go back and forth, day after day with his head in the water, practicing for hours on end for swim meets that were months away.
"His work has been amazing," Bitting said.
It also has paid off. Reed owns some of Pinellas County's top times in the 50 free (22.88 seconds), 100 free (49.04) and 100 fly (57.01).
His progress was so swift, Reed quickly realized he had a choice to make.
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Reed is not only built for swimming. His body type also is exactly what coaches in other sports are looking for.
Reed played baseball for 10 years, starring on Little League teams as a pitcher. The football coach pestered him about joining the team. The junior varsity basketball coach called for two weeks straight asking if he would try out.
"That's kind of the problem," Bitting said. "The tall swimmer is ideal, but we lose those kids so many times to other sports. For males, swimming is not the most glamorous sport and they have so many opportunities."
But to get better at swimming, Reed knew he would have to give that sport his undivided attention. "It was tough, but deep down I knew I liked swimming better," he said.
Reed stuck to Bitting's blueprint.
"You can see how much he wants to improve," Bitting said. "He's there every day, swimming laps before everyone else."
The fascination with once-in-a-generation athletes is, above all, the question of what makes them so great. There never is just one answer, but rather a combination of them: physiological and mental gifts, work ethic, the will to compete and, always, happenstance.
What if Reed's parents had not started him swimming at such an early age? What if he had imagined himself a basketball player instead? In that case, he would just be another tall guy sitting on the bench - one with no idea he had missed his true calling.
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Reed does not glide along in the manner of so many elite athletes, who even outside their sport appear so comfortable in physical space, less inhibited by gravity.
When Reed ran the bases as a Little Leaguer, he often shuffled, as if uncertain of his footing.
"A lot of these tall athletes are still trying to grow into their frame," Shafer said. "They were uncoordinated on land to begin with, and now you're putting them in the water and out of their element. That's why I think's it takes a lot of work for a tall swimmer to become really good."
Reed is starting to put it all together.
When he emerged from the pool after swimming the 50 free against rival Countryside this month, he saw fists pumping in the stands, felt the vibrations of stomping feet against the pool deck and heard the roar of the crowd.
"I feel like this is the start of something big," Reed said.