Alabama’s swimming and diving teams are approaching this week’s SEC Championships at Auburn with confidence.

Coach Dennis Pursley said he is confident the teams’ regular season efforts have prepared them to have success in the championships. He said the teams were the most improved at last year’s championships, as well as in the SEC, and it is important that the teams reclaim that role this year.

“We want to continue to get better, to continue to progress,” he said. “We rewrote the record board last year especially on the men’s side, our school record board. We want to be faster this year. We want those records to drop some more.”

In preparation for the championship, both teams have begun to taper their workouts. Cutting the physical workload in half helps the athletes recover from the regular season, and sets them up to reach peak performance in the championship meets.

Junior swimmer Brett Walsh said the team focuses a lot on mental preparation. Swimming is a mentally tough sport, and the mental techniques the team works on are designed to keep them from overthinking 
the moment.

“[We need to] focus on one thing at a time,” Walsh said. “I was always told to imagine, for my race specifically, that there is like a black curtain over your race, so all that matters right now is 
that race.”

Junior swimmer Emma Saunders said it is important that the teams’ confidence from previous meets carries over. Saunders said she believes the women can finish in the top six or higher. The women’s team has not placed higher than seventh at the SEC Championship in the last four years.

“We’ve come a long way since last year,” she said. “I am really excited about what we are going to do next week.”

Both the men’s and the women’s team train all year for this portion of the season, which is about trusting in preparation, Walsh said.

“We just need to do our thing, we have prepared well,” he said. “It’s just all about 
racing now.”