On April 18, Diablo Valley College swimmer Brandon James, 18, beat the national record for the men’s 200 backstroke at the Big 8 Convention.

“It felt a little unreal,” James says. “I didn’t expect to go that fast. My time was 1.45.18 min and the record was 1.45.19 min.”

“It was a great meet for everyone, team captain Kelsey Leonard says. “Brandon obviously did something great, and it’s very cool to see that represent DVC, and just shows what a great coaching staff we have.”

“I tried to play a lot of sports when I was younger, but only swimming seems to stuck with me,” James says. Both of my parents are swimmers so that might be one of the reasons why.” 

James has been swimming for 10 years. He says when he was younger, one of his club coaches noticed he was not succeeding in practices and believed James was not applying himself. However, that was not the case.

“Back then, I was still growing very quickly,” James says. “It was hard for me to swim correctly and coordinate every movement during practice.”

When his coach said that he would not be able to do much in the past, those words became the best and worst advice he ever received. He says it’s the reason he pushes himself so hard in order to prove to his coach that he can do it.

Now, James’ daily routines consist of swimming practice in the morning, classes and more swimming practice in the afternoon. Like any other college student, he said it’s difficult to keep up with everything, but he keeps pushing himself to become a successful student and athlete.

“I am doing pretty well in school, and everyone in the team as well,” he says. “It feels great to be a part of the DVC team. Rick is an amazing coach, and every coach contributes.”
James enjoys the group aspect of being a part of the swim team.

“There is a lot of one-on-one help,” he says. “Everyone in the team is friendly and energetic.”

Some practices are harder than the others, but as always, he just pushes through and finishes the practices each day. Practice consists of a lot of kicking, underwater dolphin kicks, breath control and the technical aspects of the each stroke.

“James is usually very laid back,” teammate Dylan Powell says. “But during hard practices and test sets, he would give every ounce of energy he’s got. He contributes a wide variety of things, not just point -wise, but also through his sportsmanship.”

James is a business major, but swimming is what he would like to pursue in the future.

As for next year, he will be training for the Olympic trials, and he is hoping to eventually make it to the Olympics. 

“Always have the right mind set.” James says. “Just push through it when it gets hard and definitely put a lot of efforts into the underwater breathing practice and technical aspect of the strokes.”