My Favorite Swimming Photos From 2024

Last year I didn’t get to the pool as much as I have in the past. I was lucky enough to photograph the Minnesota swim team again during the Big Ten Swimming and Diving Championships. They have hired me the last couple of times that they have been here, and I am always grateful that they have. I also photographed the NCC Championships at the pool for the local paper. In all of my years making photos in that pool the high school meet was the only one where I have been asked for my credential. It was a fun meet though that provided me with a couple of photos that I really liked.

We start off the list with a scene setter from the Big Tens held this past spring. I have been lucky enough to photograph a few of these now. They are always fun to cover because the stakes are so high. With the expanded Big Ten I think my opportunities will be fewer now, but I hope that hosting is an option again in the future.

Details are fun to get at these swimming events. Here you see the mother of a Harrison swimmer with an earring for her son. This event was for the  paper and this was a perfect photo for the gallery.

I found a spot during the diving event where I could set up this photo of the divers practicing their moves before heading to the board. The Big Ten signage in the background helps tell the story of when this was made.

I had some fun with my friend Mark’s 400mm lens during the week. My 300mm lens was still not sent so I had to borrow a lens. It really let me get right in on the action though. When it worked and I could focus between the water droplets it gave me some great results.

Indiana won the Big Ten meet that I covered. I was not there to photograph them, but I was walking through the area when they were taking this celebratory selfie. I had a camera with me so why not make a photo?

Another detail photo from the Big Tens. You can have whole heats where you don’t have an athlete swimming. I try and find something for me team during that time. This is a fun photo that helps break up the gallery a little bit.

Matthew Klinge is a local swimmer that has big things ahead of him. Here he helps power his IM team to a win.

Sometimes on the longer swim races I will start to slow my shutter down to make some photos. By slowing things down you can really see the violence that it takes to get through the water.

When covering a championship weekend you get much better photos when your team is doing good. Here I was lucky enough to have a swimmer win a race, and the emotion really starts to come out in those situations.

We close the countdown with another scene setter photo. I already had some photos of the divers tight so I decided to zoom out a bit to show some of the scope of where they were diving. I really like these photos.

Swimming is not a sport that I naturally know what to do. I have covered it enough now over the years though that I have started to figure some things out. I don’t have any swimming on the schedule right now for 2025, but hopefully that will change.