It took him a while, but Owen Daly’s got it figured out now.
“I was young, and I was enjoying having fun with friends,” he was saying over the phone from Montreal this week, talking about his post-high school days in St. John’s, “and it clashed with my swimming schedule.
“I’d be getting home late, missing practice the next morning. Now I understand what it takes. I’m on a straight path.
“I guess you could say I’m more mature.”
“Mature” wasn’t a word to describe Owen Daly years ago. Then again, he’s only 22 now, and some kids grow up quicker than others.
Daly wasn’t one of them. But boy, could he swim.
It’s just that, well, he wasn’t a dog for it.
That’s changed, apparently.
“I always knew I had what it takes, but I’m not sure I was willing to sacrifice,” he said. “It takes so much work to get to the top level. You have to commit everything to it.
“I’m ready now to make that sacrifice.”
Daly was one of the finest male swimmers produced in the St. John’s Legends club that operates out of the Aquarena. He still owns a bunch of provincial records, and a rack of medals, including silver at the 2013 Canada Summer Games in Sherbrooke, Que.
With Daly, though, he left you with a feeling there was more to give. Sherbrooke was actually a bit of a disappointment as more was expected from Daly.
But like we said, that’s changed.
Call it the maturity of Owen Daly.
Today, he’s one of the fastest swimmers in Canada — he is the No. 1 ranked male in the country in the 50-metre butterfly — following an outstanding 2018 RBC Canadian national swimming championship last month in Montreal.
The 6-4 speedster won three gold medals, a silver and a bronze and is now smack dab in the middle of the conversation for Canada’s Olympic team for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
“I think I’m right on track,” he said
After graduation from Gonzaga High School, Daly enrolled at Memorial University, though he admits now he had no clue what he wanted to do with the rest of his life.
He was training, but certainly not as hard as he had done so previously. A herniated disc in his back played a big part in that.
“Swimming, to be honest, was probably the last thing on my mind,” he said. “You try swimming with a herniated disc in your back.”
The Memorial experiment lasted a year before he headed out west, to Calgary where he knew coach Mike Blondal, and trained with the university’s swim team.
Daly’s back was getting better, and he was beginning to get the itch again.
While in high school, Daly had been invited to Montreal to train with the CAMO Swimming Aquatic Club.
“I loved it there,” he said.
So after a year in Alberta, Daly made the decision to come back east, to the CAMO club and enrolment at Montreal’s Concordia University.
That was three years ago.
“I’ve got a great group of friends here,” he said. “I’ve got the coaching and the training. I’m really comfortable in Montreal.”
He’s 100 per cent healthy now, and currently the fourth-ranked male swimmer in Canada in the 100-metre freestyle (he’s actually tied for fourth) and the 100 butterfly. He’s ranked fifth in the 50 free.
At nationals, Daly enjoyed seven personal-best times, despite, he said, feeling a bit tired heading into the meet.
He doesn’t have a lot of time to let his mind wander, with a weekly training schedule that has him the pool 23 hours per week, and business courses he’s taking at Concordia University.
Daly is looking forward to the summer, when he goes on a month-long tour of Spain, Italy and France, swimming in places like Barcelona and Monaco.
The big enchilada, however, are the 2020 Canadian Olympic Trials and Tokyo Games.
These next Trials will be the third Olympic team selection process in which Daly’s swam, and it’s a dream, he says, that he wants to fulfil now more than ever before.
“To be brutally honest,” he said, “in the past I wasn’t focused on the Olympics. It was rather to go out and swim fast.
“But I always knew I had what it takes. I guess it’s taken me this long to figure it out and commit to it.”
IN SHORT
It will be nothing short of shocking if Carl English is not back with the St. John’s Edge next season in some capacity (it says here he’ll almost assuredly give it one more go on the court). So, his comments this week about his uncertainty regarding next season, and the possibility of heading back to Europe, were surprising. Even more surprising when the Edge are selling tickets for next season, and the last thing potential buyers want to hear is English may be heading back overseas … I personally like the guy — as personable and friendly as any coach we’ve ever had in St. John’s — but I wouldn’t expect Jeff Dunlap back in St. John’s next season. I believe Dunlap when he says he’d like to return to St. John’s (he likes coaching the Edge, but loves the general manager side of things), but let’s just say he doesn’t have 100 per cent backing within the organization … Has anyone noticed the two of top dogs in Newfoundland and Labrador justice have uncanny similarities? Royal Newfoundland Constabulary Chief Joe Boland and Don Roche, the province’s superintendent of prisons, are both from the same community (Logy Bay-Middle Cove-Outer Cove), were both all-star softball players as opponents, and were all-star hockey teammates on Outer Cove of the Avalon East league … Kudos to Troy Croft and Sport NL for coming up with a unique fundraiser — The Great Sports Chase, an online lottery — which will help provincial sports organizations. The PSOs need all the help they can get, because it’s not coming from government, and the private sector is getting tapped out. Not sure how they’ll spend the money, or even how much they’ll get, but it needs to go towards athlete development. We’re rapidly falling behind the rest of Canada — Atlantic Canada in particular — and that’s unacceptable … The Blue Jays’ Lourdes Gurriel Jr. stepped to the plate against the Cleveland Indians the other night donning a pair of batting gloves, a compression sleeve on his right arm, elbow pad, a pad covering his shin and stretching down to the top of his cleat, and a piece added on to his batting helmet covering his jaw. What is this? Football? Remember when George Brett would grab a bat and pull on a lid and stroll up to the plate and hit one in the gap? … The Newfoundland and Labrador Basketball Association needs to ban the three-point shot in minor and junior high hoops …
Robin Short is The Telegram’s Sports Editor. He can be reached by email [email protected] Follow him on Twitter @TelyRobinShort
