Oh Yes! You guessed it...That is Mr. Ryan Lochte in all his handsomeness

Ever since I started coaching for SWIMMAC, I have been looking forward to this one swim meet - the Charlotte UltraSwim Meet. We have hosted this meet for the past few years, it's a very fast meet, swimmers have to have qualifying times for UltraSwim, and a ton of Olympians compete in it every year. Well, this year it was HUGE because of what swimming brought to the Olympics in 2008. The most coveted tickets to the meet were the Gold Medal Seating tickets at Finals, and those tickets sold for $450 a piece! Of course, as SWIMMAC coaches, we received a coach's pass and could pretty much roam wherever we wanted to. So, I got to stand directly over the lanes as I watched some of the best athletes in the sport of swimming such as, Michael Phelps, Aaron Piersol, Cullen Jones, Mark Gangloff, Freddy Busquet (and many more), and of course, my favorite swimmer of all - Ryan Lochte (see above)...
Luckily, I was able to get a picture with him, but not before making a blubbering idiot out of myself. The president of USA Swimming offered to introduce me to Ryan Lochte, so naturally, I accepted his generous offer! As we approached Ryan, he introduced me by saying, "Ryan-I want you to meet Laura Beth Minnich. She coaches 12&U with SWIMMAC." We shook hands. He introduced himself. Then I introduced myself by repeating verbatim what the USA Swimming president had already said. As if that wasn't bad enough, I was sweating profusely and the redness was slowly creeping up my neck to my face. Then, I said the most ridiculously thing ever...."Nice to meet you. I'm really sorry, but can I get a picture with you? My kids would love it!" He replies, "Of course. Why are you apologizing?" I reply, "Ummm, uhhh, hmmmm, ummm, ya, I'm just really embarassed!" I think to myself after turning beat red, "WHAT IN THE WORLD DID I JUST SAY AND WHERE THE HEC DID THAT COME FROM? WHO SAYS THAT?" Needless to say, I got my picture and got out of that situation FAST! Unfortunately, he walked by me again 20 minutes later, looked straight at me and started laughing. Gosh! What an idiot I am! Oh, well, it was all worth it for that picture! Words can't describe what an awesome experience I had at that meet - watching the fastest swimmers in the world compete was amazing! I am blessed to have been given that opportunity!