WSN: Kaley McIntyre is a junior captain on the women’s swimming team here at NYU. She’s a two-time NCAA Division III Swimmer of the Year with 10 national titles in the 50 freestyle, 100 freestyle, 200 freestyle, and 800 freestyle relay. She’s the three-time national champion in the 50 and 200 free, meaning she has won those events all three years she’s been a collegiate swimmer. Thanks for joining me today, Kaley. Those are some insane accolades, obviously.
McIntyre: Thank you.
WSN: And I just wanted to ask you about the D-IIInational championship that was March 19th through [March] 22nd.
McIntyre: Mm-hmm.
WSN: So it was right at the beginning of spring break. As I mentioned, you swam incredibly, and I’m just wondering what your mindset was going in there as the defending champion in multiple events and overall.
McIntyre: Um, I was definitely very nervous. The first day [was] the 50 free, which is a very stressful event just because my freshman year I won it by three one-hundredths of a second. It’s a very close race normally. But, I also trust in all of the training that I’ve done. So we swim…we start our season in September, and then we go all the way through March. So it’s a pretty long season that we have, um, which is really good because it gives months of preparation. So I just trusted my training, I trusted my coaches, I trusted my teammates. And my goal was just to have fun. ‘Cause this whole season — because it is super long, um… collegiate sports are supposed to be fun. And so that’s something I just try to remember.
WSN: You mentioned the team and the coaching staff behind you. How do you make sure that you’re trusting your teammates in these relay events that you excel at?
McIntyre: Um, I think it’s just knowing that all your teammates want to be successful and that they put in the work every single day that we’re at practice, and it’s just trusting that they’re gonna show up with the best of their…their ability that day, which sometimes isn’t always, you know, their best ever. But you just have to trust that they still gave a hundred percent of what they had that day.
WSN: What is your practice schedule and training schedule like here?
McIntyre: So we practice six days a week, um, and we have…for the non-distance swimmers, it’s eight practices. And if you’re a distance swimmer, you have nine practices a week. We [non-distance swimmers] do [double practices] twice a week. So my shortest training day is three hours of practice where we have two hours of swim, an hour of lift. And then other days we’ll have an extra hour and 15 [minutes] in the morning — we do dry land, we do abs, we lift. Um, it’s kind of a lot.
WSN: Right. So when you say you’re putting in the work, you really are. So I feel like the burning question is, how are you so good? And why are you at this school? I am wondering how the recruiting process went for you talking to the coaches and why you decided on NYU.
McIntyre: Well, I think you could ask that question to a lot of my teammates, which is a really good thing that our program is so strong and a lot of us could be at a Division I school if we had wanted to be. My recruiting was definitely affected by COVID. Which, I hate to bring it up, but I wasn’t…was not able to compete in swim meets during the crucial part of recruiting, which is your sophomore and junior year. I wasn’t able to compete and — except I had won the meet, I think that I was able to do — so I definitely didn’t have the times for a lot of top D-I schools, and so I pushed for academics and NYU really fit all the boxes. It also just offered a great, different experience from everything I grew up having. You know, I’m from California, I’m near San Francisco, but I definitely didn’t live in a city. So I was just doing a little change of pace for college. And the coaches, you know, sold a really good program.
WSN: When did you start swimming in California?
McIntyre: Um, I started competitive swimming when I was 4 years old. Um, that was just summer league, so it was a few months of the year. It was very relaxed. And then I got into year-round swimming full-time when I was 12 and I dropped all my other sports at that time. And so it’s been 18 — or by the time I’m done — I’ll have an 18-year career.
WSN: That’s crazy. You say by the time you’re done — is it looking like next year might be the last year of swimming for you?
McIntyre: Yeah, I think it definitely will be.
WSN: Like you mentioned, you practice six days a week. How has this affected your normal college experience and your classes and stuff like that?
McIntyre: Well, I think what’s kind of nice about NYU is there’s not a huge traditional college experience. So it doesn’t really feel like I’m missing out on a whole lot. There’s definitely some days where I’m too tired to do anything, where it kind of feels like I’m wasting living in the city with all the opportunities that it has. But you know, I get my free time in April and a little bit of time in at the end of August here just to, like, do whatever I want, which I definitely take advantage of, um…But it’s definitely interesting. I think having all the training keeps me on track with schoolwork. I get very lazy when I don’t have a set schedule. But it is definitely challenging, but that’s what’s nice about having my teammates there to support. We end up just being in a library together and it’s pretty useful.
WSN: How has the grueling practice schedule taken a toll on you other than that? Have you had any bad reactions or anything that you’ve needed sports medicine recovery for?
McIntyre: Yeah. We do this thing called Pier 40 at the beginning of the year where we start out all of our morning practices at Pier 40 with just running.It’s conditioning basically. And I’m not meant to be a runner. So at the…my freshman year when we did it, I got really bad shin splints, which was really fun to deal with. And then last year, or this year, I almost had a stress fracture, so that was not fun.
WSN: Right.
McIntyre: It took me out for a little bit of time. So shout-out to the sports med, our trainers there for helping me through that. Because, um, shin splints and stress fractures are not a common swimming injury. And then I also have pretty bad shoulder injuries just from overuse. So they help me with rehab just to get through. I only have one more year.
WSN: Going into this final year, what are your goals and how are you gonna continue the success?
McIntyre: Um, I just wanna build off the success that our programs have had in the years that I’ve been here. The program has transformed a lot. We went from getting fifth and then third and then second, um, at [the NCAA championships] , and we went from getting third at [the UAA championships] to second and almost getting first. So it’s just a huge growth that this program has seen over the last few years. And it’s really exciting. I’m excited to build off of that and hopefully continue my success, but I think the team’s success is what I’m really looking forward to.
WSN: Awesome. Thank you so much for joining me.
McIntyre: Thank you.
Contact Sidney Snider at [email protected].
