I'm someone who doesn't give two s***s about sports or the olympics, and I kept reading all the way through.

I thought about William Zinsser's comments on reading an essay by E.B. White called "The Hen":

"There’s a man writing about a subject I have absolutely no interest in. Yet I enjoy this piece thoroughly. … [M]ainly what I like is that this is a man telling me unabashedly about a love affair with poultry that goes back to 1907. It’s written with humanity and warmth, and after three paragraphs I know quite a lot about what sort of man this hen-lover is."

I don't care whether or not Sara Dickerman is as great a writer as E.B. White, the principle is still the same. I enjoyed the references to Gone with the Wind and Cher (though the Cher one wasn't quite as effective because most of us probably had to click over and remind ourselves what she was referring to).

Anyway, good job. Now I know more about swimming than I ever have in my life.