In a sport where athletes generally begin to hone their craft during the elementary school years, it has never been a question of whether these athletes would swim or not. This has been a part of their lives for over a decade now - waking up at six for practice and smelling of chlorine for an entire day almost seems normal by now.
How quickly time goes by.
This Saturday at Scheerr Pool, six seniors will enter the water for their final dual meet of their swimming careers.
"It's really crazy to think about, because you start off swimming at nine, ten, twelve, and you never really think about the end," senior captain Devin McGlynn said.
"Every week you have so many practices, it goes on for so long. All of a sudden to come to the end, it's really crazy. It's unfathomable."
When this year's batch of seniors arrived at Penn, the Quakers were in the midst of one of the most abysmal segments of Penn's swimming history -- a six-year, 42-meet Ivy losing streak.
The next year, coinciding with Mike Schnur's promotion to the head-coaching perch, the Quakers snapped that streak by narrowly beating Cornell, 153-145, in Sheerr Pool.
Not surprisingly, both of this year's senior captains played a substantial role in that victory -- both April Fletcher and McGlynn helped to anchor the 400 freestyle relay to victory by .81 seconds.
"Basically the whole focus of this team has changed. When we first got that first win, I think everything started to change," McGlynn said. "When we knew we could win one, we figured why not win two, why not win four?"
Why not, indeed.
Penn would not lose to Cornell during the next two seasons, either. In fact, Cornell has almost become an afterthought in terms of Ivy League competition. The Quakers trounced the hapless Big Red squad, 185-115, two seasons ago, while repeating the performance this past season, 178-118.
The Quakers then moved on to bigger foes, defeating Harvard for the first time since 1984 last year and cruising past Columbia for the first time since 1990 this year.
It's safe to say that these seniors have seen the Penn women's swimming program grow before their eyes.
"Every year we've done something that we never would have even thought possible the year before," Fletcher said. "It's been really satisfying to see how much this team has gone forward."
While just three years ago, it was almost predicted that the Quakers would take their rightful place as the Ancient Eight's annual cellar dweller, the seniors will enter this year's final dual meet on a team that has legitimate contentions to grab an unprecedented fourth place finish at Ivy League Championships.
The seniors "have been through a lot. It's not just their efforts in the meets, they've been instrumental in our success," Schnur said. "They represent where our women's team is going."
Saturday's meet also happens to be the first competition this season in which both the men and women will swim together at Scheerr Pool.
While the squads train daily together, the men and women have only swum together in a meet once this year, and that was in a seventy-point debacle against Brown.
"You score the wins as women's and men's, but your friends are across both teams," McGlynn said.
Past senior meets have not typically featured the dual-squad format, but this Saturday's meet should provide an ideal atmosphere.
"It should make it twice as special, because all the senior men, all the senior women and all of their parents will be there," Schnur said. "It will be that much more special to have 60 people on deck instead of 30."
La Salle should not pose any threat to the Quakers in terms of winning the meet this Saturday, and Schnur plans to slightly skew the lineup. The meet will also give several swimmers their final chances to qualify for the ECACs at the end of February.
Yet, the main focus of this meet will be the seniors. It is a group that saw its coach change during its sophomore season, and it is a group that endured a year which produced zero wins in the Ivy League.
How quickly things change, how quickly things end.
"It'll be really strange," Fletcher said. "It should be a good last meet. I'm excited for it."
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