North Hampton's Reich will savor the very big moment at U.S. Olympic Team Trials
May 23—The event will be held at an NFL stadium and every competitor there will be aiming to make the Olympics.
It might be easy for athletes to lose their composure, Max Reich figures, considering the atmosphere and magnitude of the U.S. Olympic Team Trials for swimming June 15-23 at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis.
Reich, a North Hampton resident and St. Thomas Aquinas High alum, will again compete in both the 100- and 200-meter breaststroke at the trials.
If he is one of the top two swimmers after the heats, semifinals and finals in either event, Reich will make the Team USA roster for the Paris Olympics this summer. Reich, who just concluded his college career at swimming powerhouse Indiana University, said the trials will be the last swim meet of his career if he doesn't make the team.
To prevent the moment from overwhelming him, Reich will rely on advice he received from two former U.S. Olympians he is training with, Cody Miller and Lilly King.
"If you can just keep it simple and not elevate it in your head to something it really isn't, in reality, I think that's when you're going to do your best," Reich said Thursday. "Just trying to avoid thinking like, 'Oh my God, this is Olympic trials. I have to perform,' and instead kind of shifting that mindset to being more like, 'This is just another long course meet. You've done hundreds of these in your life. ... You're going to be fine.'"
Reich finished 22nd in the 200 breaststroke at the 2020 U.S. Olympic trials, which were held in 2021 due to the pandemic. He logged a time of 2 minutes, 14.04 seconds in that event, and finished 28th in the 100 breaststroke (1:01.96).
Miller, who won bronze in the 100 breaststroke and helped Team USA take gold in the 4-by-100 individual medley relay at the 2016 Summer Games and King, a two-time Olympian and five-time Olympic medalist, are both Indiana alums.
Reich, who considers the 200 breaststroke his best event, has trained and worked with both of them over his time in the Hoosiers program and views Miller, 32, like an older brother.
"They're both just the most supportive human beings that I've ever gotten to train with," Reich said. "I would say that they've both just taken everyone on the (Indiana) varsity team right now that's seen huge success in the breaststroke group. ... they've just taken us under their wing."
At IU, Reich learned from the man he considers the best breaststroke coach in the world: Hoosiers head swimming coach Ray Looze.
Looze taught Reich how to swim in high-pressure environments. The coach purposefully created high-intensity and stressful practices, Reich said, so his Hoosiers would be well-prepared for big meets. Reich said Looze also emphasized doing whatever you are doing in swimming or life to your maximum potential so that you have no regrets.
Reich has always been a goal-driven swimmer but he spent his past two seasons at Indiana focusing more on the reasons he originally fell in love with swimming: being in the water, competing against the clock and being with his teammates.
When Indiana took fourth at the NCAA Championships in March, Reich placed 12th in the 200 breaststroke with a time of 1:52.28, earning Second Team All-America honors.
"When you get to any point in elite athletics, you're going to get caught up in constantly trying to pursue your goals and forgetting about the things that brought you joy in the first place," Reich said. "I feel like a lot of the times, the thing that gets you over the hump of having success is just keeping it simple and remembering why you do what you do."
While in high school, Reich competed on the club circuit for Haverhill, Mass.-based Phoenix Swimming, which will have two other alumni from New Hampshire at the trials.
Manchester's Alexei Avakov and Reich will compete against each other in the 100 breaststroke. Durham's William Carrico will compete in the 400 individual medley.
Avakov, who will swim at Indiana next school year, and Carrico, a University of North Carolina-Wilmington freshman, were teammates with Reich at Phoenix.
Reich is hanging up his goggles to continue his education at Indiana. He will begin his two-year masters program in journalism and investigative journalism fellowship next school year.
"I'm excited for the next chapter," Reich said. "Swimming has given me friends, life lessons — just so many things I'm going to take away from the sport but, at the same time, I'm ready to step away."
