Gotta step up my game!
Jan
6Gotta step up my game!
Posted by Kevin Doak on Wednesday at: 6:42am (January 6th, 2010)
I love competition! This guy's times are really gonna push me. I don't frequently check other national times but I found myself on the USMS website looking into my own progress and saw some FANTASTIC times in the 30-34 age group by a swimmer by the name of Derya Büyükuncu. He apparently swam some Masters meets this past year. This guys times are (by comparison to me) impressive.
Taken from Wikipedia:
"Derya Büyükuncu (born July 2, 1976) is an olympic backstroke and butterfly swimmer from Turkey, who competed in five consecutive Summer Olympics for his native country, starting in 1992. Beijing 2008 was his fifth Olympic Games. He won the bronze medal in the 100 m Backstroke at the 2000 FINA Short Course World Championships, behind America's Neil Walker and Cuba's Rodolfo Falcon."
I think swim fans from MI will remember him swimming at U of M in the 90's. He flew under my radar though since I didn't keep track of U of M back then. He's the fastest guy to ever swim backstroke for the country of Turkey. He has competed in the Olympics 5 times as well as medaled in various World Championships since then. I have some great competition in Masters Swimming as you can tell! Lets do some quick comparisons of my 2009 USMS times vs. his USMS 2009 times:
50 Back SCM:
Kevin Doak: 25.22
Derya Büyükuncu: 24.81
100 Back SCM:
Kevin Doak: 55.26
Derya Büyükuncu: 52.68 (!)
Yea... He's THAT much faster than me in the 100 back. For those with math skills like me, that's a 2.58 second difference! It's not far from comparing myself to Aaron Piersol or Randal Bal, both World Record Holders. He's obviously a very talented swimmer. I'd like to thank Derya for motivating me to improve :)
Taken from Wikipedia:
"Derya Büyükuncu (born July 2, 1976) is an olympic backstroke and butterfly swimmer from Turkey, who competed in five consecutive Summer Olympics for his native country, starting in 1992. Beijing 2008 was his fifth Olympic Games. He won the bronze medal in the 100 m Backstroke at the 2000 FINA Short Course World Championships, behind America's Neil Walker and Cuba's Rodolfo Falcon."
I think swim fans from MI will remember him swimming at U of M in the 90's. He flew under my radar though since I didn't keep track of U of M back then. He's the fastest guy to ever swim backstroke for the country of Turkey. He has competed in the Olympics 5 times as well as medaled in various World Championships since then. I have some great competition in Masters Swimming as you can tell! Lets do some quick comparisons of my 2009 USMS times vs. his USMS 2009 times:
50 Back SCM:
Kevin Doak: 25.22
Derya Büyükuncu: 24.81
100 Back SCM:
Kevin Doak: 55.26
Derya Büyükuncu: 52.68 (!)
Yea... He's THAT much faster than me in the 100 back. For those with math skills like me, that's a 2.58 second difference! It's not far from comparing myself to Aaron Piersol or Randal Bal, both World Record Holders. He's obviously a very talented swimmer. I'd like to thank Derya for motivating me to improve :)