Olympic hopeful a chip off the ol' block

For a while there, swimming was going to be Nancy Swider-Peltz Jr.'s thing.

Not speedskating. Definitely not speedskating.

Swider-Peltz Jr. distinctly remembers times as a kid when she felt like she was being dragged to watch her mom coach a couple of local skaters.

"I just didn't enjoy it very much," the 22-year-old said. "I wanted to do something different."

Well, that notion didn't last long. Not that we should be surprised.

Swider-Peltz Jr., a native of Wheaton and a 2005 graduate of Wheaton North High School, is not only born from a world-class speedskater, she also shares the same name.

Mother Nancy Swider- Peltz is a four-time Olympian who grew up in Park Ridge and got her start skating around the local ponds there.

Of course, you know what they say about the apple not falling far from the tree. That probably goes double for a namesake.

Eventually, the younger Swider-Peltz did get the same bug that drove her mother to greatness from 1976 through 1988.

And she, like her mother, has become one of the best speedskaters in the country - if not the world.

Two weeks ago, Swider-Peltz Jr. won her first all-around national title at the U.S. Long Track Speedskating Championships in West Allis, Wis.

That qualified her to compete against the best speedskaters in North America this weekend in a regional qualifier in Salt Lake City.

If she finishes among the top six there, she will go to the World All-Around Championships in Norway next month.

Each prestigious event gets her a step closer to a spot on the 2010 U.S. Olympic team.

"My mom was in four Olympics," Swider-Peltz Jr. said. "Getting to at least two Olympics is my goal. That would be such a blessing and an honor. It would make all the hard workouts and sacrifices worth it."

Because speedskating isn't your everyday, garden-variety sport, it's not easy to find places to practice.

So mother and daughter often make the trek to Milwaukee several times a week to rent ice time at one of the few indoor speedskating rinks in the country - and the only one in the Midwest.

Swider-Peltz Jr.'s mom is her coach.

"I pretty much spend my life with my mom," she said. "My mom and I are really close."

Likewise, the elder Swider-Peltz was close with her father, which is why she decided to keep his surname even when she married, and then pass it down to her daughter.

Swider-Peltz placed only as high as seventh during her Olympic run but showed incredible longevity in competing as long as she did. Four-time Olympians, after all, are about as tough to come by as an indoor speedskating facility.

"I was born in 1987, and one of the funny stories my mom tells is that during the Olympic trials that year, she would nurse me between races," Swider-Peltz Jr. said. "She trained hard, though. She made the 1988 Olympics even though she had a baby."

The next time Swider-Peltz tried to make an Olympic team, she actually competed against her daughter.

In the spring of 2001, the then-45-year-old Swider-Peltz decided on a whim to compete at the U.S. trials for the 2002 Olympics - just to see if she still had it.

And maybe to provide a neat little footnote in speedskating history.

That year, Swider-Peltz Jr. was competing in her first Olympic trials.

"It was funny because they pair you up to race against one other person, and my mom's name was the first name pulled," said Swider-Peltz Jr., who was 14 at the time. "And my name was second. She ended up beating me.

"That was the last time she beat me."

Now, mom's job is to make sure no one else beats out her daughter. At least not before she has a chance to go to her own Olympics.

"It's hard to really tell what my chances are," Swider-Peltz Jr. said of making the 2010 Olympics. "It always comes down to one day and how you do on that one day (at the trials).

"But God gave me the talent and the drive to succeed. I set high goals and I don't really settle for anything less than that. So we'll see."

pbabcock@dailyherald.com