About 150 youngsters from across Mississippi plunged into the Vicksburg City Pool Saturday to get special instruction from “The Anchor.”
“The Anchor” is the nickname of former Olympian Jason Lezak, whose world record anchor leg on the winning U.S. 4×100-meter freestyle relay — and his performance in the 4×100-meter medley relay — at the 2008 Olympics in Bejing, China, helped Michael Phelps break Mark Spitz’s record of seven gold medals for swimming set at the 1972 Munich Olympics. Phelps finished with eight.
The four-time Olympian was in Vicksburg conducting a clinic on swimming strokes for the young swimmers as part of Mississippi Swimming’s state convention and Top 5 awards banquet, which was being held at the Vicksburg Convention Center.
“We hold the banquet every year and the clinic every two years,” Vicksburg Swim Association coach Matthew Mixon said. “I’m chairman of the banquet this year, so I planned it for here, to give people a look at our city and our facilities, and get them interested in coming here and competing. When you count the parents, we’ve got about 300 people here (at the pool), and we’ll have about 300 at the banquet.”
Mixon said other Olympians have conducted clinics for Mississippi Swimming in the past, adding, “I’d like to be able to get an Olympian every two years for the clinics.”
“It was really cool,” Sarah Bennett Smith, 13, of Cleveland said. “It’s something I won’t forget.”
Her friend, 12-year-old Caleb Owens, also from Cleveland, added, “It was great that he was here to help us improve. It was terrific.”

“It was fun having come to fix our strokes,” said Wilkie Gowa, 12, of Jackson. Her comments were echoed by Amanda Welch, 14, of Laurel, who said she learned some tips from Lezak to help her swimming stroke.
“It was pretty cool,” said Katie Martin, 16, of Vicksburg. “It’s great when you have someone who knows what he’s doing. He’s good at what he does. (St. Aloysius swimming) Coach Bruce (Ebersole) was right about streamline.”
Her brothers Charlie and Tommy added their own thoughts.
“It helped a lot,” Charlie, 15, said. Tommy, 12, added, “It was very interesting. He was able to help me.”
Lezak, who retired from competitive swimming two years ago, said he spends most his time conducting swimming clinics across the U.S. and in foreign countries, adding life after the Olympics is “pretty busy.”
“It depends who you are and what you want to accomplish,” he said, “but I’ve enjoyed the travel and meeting people, and traveling to other countries and hopefully inspiring some kids to do well in their lives, regardless if it’s swimming or not.”

He said many different types of people attend the clinics, “so you try to do your best and make it work for as many kids as you can. Some of them, you can tell want to be Olympians, some of them are having fun, and some of them don’t want to be there.”
He said people often bring up his accomplishments in Beijing, forgetting his other accomplishments as an eight-time medalist, 2010 Pan Pacific Gold Medalist, 2010 U.S. National Medalist, and a 2009 Maccabiah Games Gold Medalist.
“It doesn’t really matter to me,” he said. “For me, I’m happy with everything, and I went through a process to get there, good or bad.”
“Club swimming is popular where I come from,” he said. “I had a great club team and a great college and then another good club team. It doesn’t matter where you are, it’s finding the passion for it.
I enjoy doing what I do, which is why I’ve been doing it for so long.”