King Novice 12

My swimming career began, age 8, on a summer program for novices in Berkeley hosted at King Junior High School (I was later a "King Cobra," 7th and 8th grade at King) where, for two months, we had daily afternoon "practices" and I was told to "burn off some steam." 

Not much to recall, really, other than the end-of-summer swimming meet where I competed against the mighty David Abalar, a chubby kid from Albany known amongst us punters to be fast. It came down to a 50-yard crawl and we went finger-tip-to-finger-tip for a judges decision as the watch keepers scored us a tie to the tenth of a second. I was declared winner - celebrity ! - and the following year signed up for the local swim team, the Berkeley Barracudas, who also trained at King. I would have joined the Barracudas sooner but I had an afternoon paper route to contend with.

Below is the King Jr High School swimming pool with the fast lane on the far right and where I spent hours of my day as an age-grouper.