Athlete of the Week: George Gleason

By Shannon Duff

Then, Dick Schoulberg, Gleason's coach at a clinic held in Germantown, Pennsylvania, talked to Yale coach Frank Keefe about Gleason's talent. Still, Keefe's contact with Gleason as a recruit was limited, and the freshman phenom never even visited the campus on an official recruiting trip.

Julia Tiernan/YH

Gleason chose Yale, however, and Keefe is pleased about the decision. "I knew this kid could be good," he said. "He had a real feel for the water and was definitely going to benefit from training with some competition."

At Yale, the pond has certainly gotten bigger...but so has the fish. Gleason's enhanced talent and training have already resulted in big contributions to the team. Yale's fastest backstroker was just tenths of a second off the winning pace in the 200-yd. backstroke at the Harvard-Yale-Princeton meet on Sat., Feb. 7.

Despite overall losses to both Harvard and Princeton, Gleason was encouraged by the team's strong performance. "The scores at this meet weren't really indicative of what a great meet we had," he explained. "[Keefe] told us that it was the best meet the team had had in five years."

As a citizen of the Virgin Islands, Gleason is eligible to represent his country in Olympic competition. His times this season in backstroke events meet the 1996 qualifying standards for the Virgin Islands Olympic team. Considering the early success Gleason has had, the Blue could very well be represented in Sydney in 2000.

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