The Simi Valley Swim Team Dips Into Foreign Exchange

The black lines on the bottom of Olympic-size swimming pools pass endlessly beneath swimmers who are in training.

But for two weeks, members of the Simi Valley Swim Team will be breaking the monotony of black with Scottish plaid.

Coach Ingrid Daland and 10 members of the team will leave Saturday to compete in the Edinburgh International swim meet April 4-7 at the Royal Commonwealth Pool in Scotland.

The Simi Valley swimmers were invited to the meet when Daland attended an international coaches conference in Colorado Springs, Col.

“I told the team that I’m not a tourist,” Daland said. “I want results.”

Daland need not worry. Every member of her team has qualified for the junior or senior nationals.

Leslie Daland, Ingrid’s daughter, is a freshman at USC. Last year, she had the third best time in the world for her age group in the 1,500 meter freestyle.

Leslie, 16, is preparing for the June swim trials of the World Championships in Orlando, Fla. If she qualifies in Florida, she will compete in August at the championships in Madrid.

But the meet in Scotland will be the first international competition for Leslie and the other members of the team.

“They’re going to go in there totally innocent,” Ingrid said. “If you always swim against the same type of people, you know how they race and how they swim. In an international situation, you don’t even know who’s coming, so you don’t get the mental blocks.”

Win or lose, Daland figures the trip will be educational.

“It’s basically a swimming trip,” she said. “They’re supposed to take their books, but we’ll see.”