SWIMMING / THERESA MUNOZ : Bergen Brings Training Skills to Napa Club

It is an unlikely marriage: Coach Paul Bergen and the Napa Valley Swim Team.

Yet with Bergen back in swimming, chances are he will have a national impact by 1996, even from Napa (population 63,800).

Although none of Bergen’s swimmers have reached the senior national level, indications are that he is making progress. Since Bergen took over as coach 1 1/2 years ago, the team has grown from 40 to 150 swimmers, four of whom are expected to qualify for the Junior Nationals West, March 23-27 at Belmont Plaza Pool in Long Beach.

Bergen, one of the great coaching talents in the United States in the late 1970s and early ‘80s, returned to swimming after four years as a horse trainer.

“I missed it,” said the former Nashville Aquatic Club and University of Texas coach. “I think it is something I do fairly well, and the time off helped me gain perspective.”

Bergen’s return to coaching was surprising enough, but in Napa? This is a man who coached three-time Olympic gold medalist Tracy Caulkins, as well as the 1988 Canadian Olympic team.

“It surprised me, too,” Bergen said. “But I’m a pretty small-town boy. My wife and I have always been a little uncomfortable in big cities, so the opportunity to live in a small town and work with swimmers at a high level was too good to pass up.”

Bergen, who grew up in the dairy farming community of Muskego, Wis., hooked up with a riding stable and trained horses after the ’88 Olympic Games in Seoul.

A former pentathlete, Bergen learned quickly that horse racing is the sport of the wealthy, if not of kings. In time, he could no longer afford to own and train thoroughbreds.

Now he is applying horse-training principles to swimming.

During practices, the vast majority of his swimmers kick, pull and do stroke drills under the supervision of an assistant coach.

Every 20-30 minutes, a small group of swimmers leaves the majority and gets into one lane, where Bergen gives them his undivided attention for the most critical and demanding aspect of the practice session.

In horse training, it is similar to taking a handful of horses to sprint on the track and leaving the rest in their stalls.

“It has helped me to be a better coach,” Bergen said. “I am seeing more things.”

Given his reputation, one might expect families to send their teen-agers to Napa to train with Bergen. But so far only three swimmers--all Canadians--have made the move, and two of them, USC’s Mojca Cater and Stanford’s Allison Higson, are absent during the school year.

“To be honest, I don’t think we’ve made an impression,” Bergen said. “We were so young and so bad that we haven’t gotten anybody’s attention. It is going to take time and the improvement of a number of kids under the age of 12.”

Bergen dismisses the suggestion that Napa lacks the population base to produce national-caliber talent.

“It only takes a couple athletes,” he said.

There are amenities. The team is able to rent a 50-meter pool and a weight training room at Napa Valley College. And Bergen recently attracted assistants Jack Simon and Jeff Kubiak. Simon, former head coach of the Cincinnati Marlins, developed 1992 Olympian Joey Hudepohl and UCLA standout freshman Michael Andrews.

Swimming Notes

Sven Hackman impressed at the Q meet last weekend at Belmont Plaza in Long Beach with victories in the 1,000-yard freestyle (9:19.06) and the 200 freestyle (1:40.02). Hackman was suspended by the German Swimming Federation last March and denied a berth in the German Olympic trials after testing positive for steroids. Hackman contends that the Los Angeles doctor who treated his injured elbow in December of 1991 injected him with a banned substance without his knowledge. Hackman is training with Coach Terry Stoddard at the Rose Bowl Aquatic club.

Coaches who have ranked UCLA 16th in the latest national poll are obviously not apprised of the Bruins’ times. UCLA swimmers have the fastest times in the NCAA in six of the 13 individual events: 50-yard freestyle, Brian Kurza, (19.71 seconds); 100/200 freestyle, Michael Picotte, (43.39 and 1:36.31); 100/200 breaststroke and 200 individual medley, Greg Schaffer, (54.70, 1:57.71 and 1:47.29). Moreover, the Bruins’ 400 medley relay team is the fastest in the nation (3:15.38), and UCLA is ranked second in the other four relays.

The UCLA women’s 200 freestyle relay team is ranked second (1:33.88), and freshman Richelle Depold has the third-fastest 50 freestyle in the NCAA (22.95).

Chad Carvin, an Arizona freshman from Laguna Hills, has clocked the fastest 500 freestyle in the nation (4:18.79).

Four-time national champion Kristine Quance of Northridge turned down scholarship offers from Texas and Brigham Young and narrowed her list to UCLA, Arizona and Stanford. UCLA has several advantages, including the possibility of a post-graduate scholarship, and perhaps most important, the possibility of David Bourne attending classes in Westwood. Bourne, Quance’s boyfriend of three years and a standout catcher at Kennedy High, has been accepted at UCLA and has drawn interest from Bruin baseball Coach Gary Adams. At Arizona, Quance would have the opportunity to practice with the men’s team, a decided advantage because few women train at her speed.

Butterfly swimmer Pablo Morales, the improbable winner of two gold medals in the Barcelona Games, will receive the USOC sportsman-of-the-year award, Feb. 13 in Phoenix.

U.S. Swimming’s board of directors approved Sunday an athletes’ executive committee proposal for the dispersal of a $350,000 grant from the U.S. Olympic Committee. Pending approval from the USOC, swimmers who qualify will receive $400 per month to offset the cost of training for the 1994 World Championships in Rome. Payment will begin in September and run through Sept. 1994, but times will be considered as of Jan. 1, 1993. To qualify, an American swimmer must be ranked in the top four in the world. The list of qualifiers will change each month as the world rankings change to reflect faster performances.

“This is to answer some concerns made last September about prize money, “ said Harris Troutman, vice chairman of the athlete’s executive committee.

Olympic silver medalist David Berkoff said: “The prize money aspect is a great idea. It is exciting. But the main thing was that we needed support as well. You don’t tell a (football) coach that he’ll get his pay check at the end of the season after he goes 10-1 and to the Rose Bowl.”

UPCOMING MEETS: NCAA--Jan. 29: UCLA women at defending NCAA champion Stanford; Jan. 30: USC women at Stanford; Feb. 5: USC men at defending NCAA champion Stanford; Feb. 6: UCLA men at Stanford; Feb. 13: UCLA women at USC, noon; Feb. 20: USC men at UCLA, 1 p.m.; Feb. 28-March 2: Pac-10 women’s championships at Belmont Plaza in Long Beach; March 4-6: Pac-10 men’s championships in Seattle; March 18-20: NCAA women’s championships, Minneapolis; March 25-27: NCAA men’s championships, Indianapolis. U.S. Swimming--March 23-27: Junior Nationals West, Belmont Plaza in Long Beach; March 31-April 4: U.S. Nationals, Nashville, Tenn.