A documented brush with swimming greatness on deck at Stevenson

So there I was, on the swimming pool deck at Stevenson High School, volunteering to be a timer at an age group meet in which my youngest son was competing.

Being on deck is a win-win for me — for one thing, it's always several degrees cooler there than in the stands. And nothing personal against all you parents who were paid attendees watching from above, but after having spent four sessions up in the bleachers myself, I needed a change of scenery.

Also, it's increasingly challenging for me to connect all the dots at these events. The coaches running the age group teams mostly hail from our state, which means I probably saw them as competitors at one time or another — but figuring out where and when can be taxing, and getting a level look at all these folks helps me piece it together.

And then there's the complex task of keeping track of the swimmers, many of them offspring of people I once raced against. Not to mention following the kids who are the sons or daughters of my wife's friends, or somehow related to the many dozens of athletes I've had the pleasure to meet while covering high school sports. Dizzying.

I was ruminating about all this when I saw the name “Maurer” next to some times on the big scoreboard at Stevenson. That name is a real whopper in Illinois swimming lore, so quite naturally I was wondering if there was a generational connection. But I quickly shelved the thought and returned to the task at hand, and the pure enjoyment of witnessing a fine bunch of young girls and boys put their whole selves into a pursuit I admire deeply.

About midway through the session, a relief timer was due to join me in lane 7.

As he walked up, his larger-than-life profile gave him away: Erik Maurer, father of the kids whose names I'd recognized on the scoreboard — and an absolute legend in Illinois swimming.

My societal filters suddenly disabled, I blurted out, “You're Erik Maurer!”

He smiled broadly at my fanboy recognition. And I guess my ability to identify him so quickly bears some explanation.

During my own college swimming years at Wisconsin, a springtime ritual was the trip into Evanston or New Trier for the high school boys swimming state championships. My college coach, Jack Pettinger, was a Fenwick grad who always had both a personal and professional interest in attending the state meet. I was along for the ride just in case a potential recruit needed any unbiased information — you know, details about just how great it was to be a member of the greatest swimming team at the greatest university on earth.

Even before high school, Maurer was well known in Illinois swimming circles for breaking national age-group records, and he only added to that profile during his high school years at Loyola. I remember watching as he won both the 100- and 200-yard freestyles as a sophomore. As his giant frame rose atop the blocks to accept his awards, I was thinking, “This kid is going to be scary-good.”

As all these memories were flooding back, I realized that Mr. Maurer had actually spoken.

To me.

Apparently, since we'd both acknowledged and confirmed his identity, he wanted to know who I was.

Right — it sounds obvious now, just basic introduction etiquette, but in the moment I was flummoxed.

Finally I summoned an absurdly awkward attempt at pleasantry, stuttering something like “My name currently is Aaron Gabriel and to meet you now is a thing of deep pleasure for me.”

And then the most amazing thing happened.

Rather than ask if I required medical assistance, Maurer brightened and said these magical words: “Distance swimmer, right? St. Charles, then Wisconsin? You kicked my (tail) a few times.”

Again, the words escaped me. I just stood there grinning, pumping away indefinitely at his handshake and trying to figure out what the heck to do next.

It was only upon reflection much later that I began to suspect Erik may not have been completely correct about one detail, the part about me kicking his tail.

I graduated from St. Charles in 1983, and he was Class of '89. With a gap like that, it's hard to imagine when we'd have actually competed against one another — perhaps in the summer of '87, when I raced in summer senior nationals, a final hurrah after exhausting my college eligibility. I would have been 21 then, Maurer 15 or 16. I guess it's possible. He was so good at such a young age, he'd probably already made his cuts for the big national meets.

In any case, I hope we can all agree that the precision of Erik's memory is certainly not what is important here.

Rather, it's that somehow one of the all-time greats in Illinois swimming was randomly placed next to me, and he miraculously knew who I was and what events I swam, sheerly through name recognition.

Maurer's high school years turned out to be a mere warm-up to his later swimming achievements. I remembered that he'd broken the high school state record in the 200 free. And I knew he'd gone on to collegiate greatness, but I missed the specifics of that phase because by that point I was in a personal post-swimming funk, dark years in which I wanted nothing to do with swimming (nor, truth be told, significant exercise or healthy behaviors of any kind).

With some persistent prodding from me, Erik filled in the gaps.

In 1992, he won the 50-yard freestyle in 19.58 seconds at the NCAA championships while competing for Stanford. The Cardinal also won the team national championship that year (and the next).

Erik married Olympic champion Lea Loveless, another Stanford swimmer. As Lea Maurer, she coached Lake Forest's boys team to a high school state championship — that was the team led by eventual Olympic gold medalist Matt Grevers — before going on to a long, successful stint as the Stanford women's swimming head coach.

See what I mean? The Maurer name is Illinois swimming royalty.

Erik explained that he's only recently back in the area after having called California home for many years, but it was difficult to have much in the way of real conversation on the Stevenson pool deck — too loud, and we really were working.

In fragments, we named-checked a handful of favored in-common swimmers (David Fix! Andy Edmondson!) and agreed on the important things — swimming is great; we both wish we could be college swimmers again; being the parent of swimmers is fun when they swim well and decidedly less so when they don't.

And we got to root for each other's kids, who, as it happens, were all swimming quite well.

Luke Maurer is a 13-year-old who came into the meet with a best time of 54-something in the 100 free and left it with a thoroughly Maurer-esque 51.26.

Rex Maurer is just 11 but already administering tail-kickings to many of the best 12-year-olds — an age group which happens to include my own 12, Henry.

After the finals of 11-12 boys 100 free, the results showed a Gabriel in place No. 11, and a Maurer in place No. 12. That thrilled me, and not because of the order of finish, but because seeing those two names adjacent to one another in the results confirms something far greater than anything their parents ever achieved in a swimming pool.

As the session ended, Erik shook my hand, smiled and said, “I guess we'll probably be seeing plenty of each other at meets, right?”

Yessir. It will be an abiding pleasure, and next time hopefully I'll be calmed down enough to assemble cogent sentences, out loud and everything.

And if at some point in the very distant future there is a question about the first time this generation of Gabriel raced this generation of Maurer, I'll have clear documentation.

Memories being what they are — flawed, sometimes gloriously so — I'll have the heat sheet to prove it.

• Aaron Gabriel is the Daily Herald's high school sports editor. Reach him at agabriel@dailyherald.com.