POOLING HIS TALENT: Landmark's Shea will swim for Division 1 Marist College

Coach John Ogden likes to keep Patrick Shea guessing when it comes to his swimming workouts at the Sterling Center YMCA in Beverly.

"It's a mixed bag with coach Ogden," said Shea, 18, who lives in Peabody. "You don't know what you're going to get."

Swimming can be such a solitary endeavor that Shea likes the suspense of Ogden's mystery workout. This is a kid who swims year round and often gets up at 4:45 a.m. to get to the pool for a 5:30 a.m. practice. It can be monotonous, so any wrinkle in the routine is welcomed by Shea.

Ogden has never had to worry about Shea slacking off in any respect, which is one of the reasons he thought the Landmark School graduate would be an excellent fit at Division 1 Marist College in Poughkeepsie, N.Y.

Shea is a freestyle specialist. He holds all the distance freestyle records for the North Shore Sharks, who have one of the largest YMCA teams in the country. Still, it's a major leap from competing in the YMCA nationals to swimming for Marist, which was ranked No. 16 nationally this season in the collegeswimming.com mid-major poll. The Red Foxes have also captured the men's division of the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference 12 of the last 13 years.

But this is precisely the kind of challenge that Shea has been gearing up for his entire life. He earned All-American status in the 1,650-yard freestyle, the 800-meter freestyle and the 800-meter freestyle relay as a club swimmer.

"At some point (in your development) you say, yes, you can become a college swimmer," said Shea. "You're competing in a higher division when you get to college. It's like being a master swimmer. That's something I wanted to do.

"It's not high school swimming anymore. It's not club swimming. You've got four years left and then you're either going into the workforce or you're going to the Olympics. So in those four years, you crank out every last ounce (of energy) to see where it takes you."

Shea, who has dyslexia and just recently graduated from the Landmark School in Beverly, initially made contact with Marist, but the interest soon became mutual. Larry VanWagner has been the Marist coach for 29 years and his dual meet record is 204-84. He can judge talent and he has a lot of contacts at the club level across the country. VanWagner liked what he heard about Shea and was even more impressed when he met the young swimmer on his official visit to Marist.

"Patrick made an immediate positive impression when he came here," said VanWagner, who also runs the women's program at Marist. "He has an extremely respectful personality and that influenced me a lot. I felt this is the kind of young man we want here.

"What I like about him as a swimmer is his work ethic. That's the No. 1 ingredient an individual has to have at this level. Regardless of your talent, you won't realize your full potential without the work ethic. You can't hide behind a team in this sport. You're up there on the block and you're competing against yourself in a sense."

The Red Foxes have a top freestyle distance swimmer returning in Spencer Hartmann, but they just graduated Ralph Rienzo, who was the MAAC champ at 1,650 meters. VanWagner can see Shea possibly sliding into that spot, based on Shea's history in that event.

"Rienzo won the 1,650 with a 16:08 and Patrick has already done a 16:10 at YMCA nationals," said VanWagner. "So Shea is already at that level and he can improve. He looks like a perfect fit. He'll swim the 500 (free), 1,000 and 1,650, but we have to wait and see what his training habits are like. It takes a considerable amount of focus for a high school swimmer to jump from the 500 to the 1,650. Instead of a five minute event, it's a 16 minute event. It's not just about endurance, it's about mental focus."

When Shea started checking out colleges — he had 16 schools on his original list — Marist had everything he was looking for. The school, he said, has an excellent support program for dyslexic students and he can major in criminal justice. The swimming program then sealed the deal.

"School is the most important thing," said Shea. "Swimming is the third thing I looked at, but it's important. I went to the pool and met the team and it worked for me. It's a hard-core group of guys. You can push them very hard, but you can't get rid of them. I like that."

If everything goes according to plan, Shea would graduate from Marist in 2012, when the Olympic Games will be held in London. He'll be 22 years old and probably in prime physical condition, yet he stops short of calling the Olympics his dream or his goal. He's a little bit superstitious about it.

"I wouldn't say it's a (dream)," said Shea. "I want to see how far I can go in swimming. It (Olympics) is something you hope for and wish for, but I'm not going to jinx myself. I will go for it."

Notable achievements: Holds all the distance freestyle records for the North Shore Sharks, which has one of the best YMCA programs in the country; All-American in the 1,650-yard freestyle, the 800-meter freestyle and the 800-meter freestyle relay; USA Swimming Scholastic All-American.

Quotable: "It can be cloak and dagger on a swimming team. If you're not working together, then you can be working against each other and you have all these cliques. If the Celtics had done that, they wouldn't have won the championship. Everyone has a different job to do, but you have to work together. At the end of the day, you fight to the finish together." — Patrick Shea talking about the value of teamwork.

Photos

Patrick Shea of Peabody, has done well nationally with the North Shore Sharks and is attending Division 1 Marist College in the fall on a swimming scholarship. Staff photo