Fred Bartlett
USMS Pool All American Honors – 1 Relay
USMS Long Distance All American Honors – 2 Relay
USMS Top Ten Achievements – 22 Relay
I grew up in a military family, which meant moving at least every two years. This also meant never putting down roots, nor ever swimming on any swim teams growing up. Both my mother and father were in the Navy and first met at an outdoor officers’ pool, which meant that after I and my three siblings were born we were always in the water in some form or fashion.
At an early age my father had us up on his shoulders, as he was on a saucer while my mother drove the boat we owned and then later we learned to saucer, then ski, then slalom ski. Everywhere we went while crisscrossing the country to new posts, we swam, mostly in open water lakes and rivers.
In 1968 we moved from Meridian, Mississippi to North Kingstown, Rhode Island. At some point my father, who was back and forth from Vietnam tours, introduced us to NEM legend Dan Rogacki. At the time, Rogacki was in the Navy and had formed a kids' swim team named the Navy Junior Swim Team. For my brother, my sisters and me, this was our first introduction to a formal swim team – sans goggles, lane lines, pull buoys, and paddles. But we did have kick boards, which I hate to this day! Both my brother and I became lifeguards at the outdoor officers’ pool at Quonset Point, Rhode Island in our high school years before the base closed in 1974.
I attended the University of Rhode Island, where I tried out for the men`s swimming/water polo teams, under now retired Coach Mick Weskott. I lasted one semester before discovering I was not talented enough to be there and focused on ice hockey, golf, racquetball, and running instead.
Fast forward, after years of golfing and running after graduating from URI, a new sport arose called triathlon, which seemed to fit me to a T, since I wasn’t top notch in any one sport, but I could do many sports at a high level. Since triathlon involved swimming first, and with my growing up swimming open water, it became a passion of mine. With triathlon a growing sport, I occasionally dropped in to fellow honoree Stuart (the human dolphin) Cromarty`s masters sessions at URI to augment my one-lone wolf training.
Once Stuart left URI, there was no masters swim program in the South County Rhode Island area. So, somewhere along the way, South County Y allowed me to start a Masters team there. We started with three lanes, which quickly grew to all five lanes, three times a week. This group has been ongoing and growing for at least 28 years.
Along the way, the team, now called the SCY WAVES, (yes, we have our own shirts, pink caps, and secret handshake) has grown to 60 USMS members, swimming in back-to-back sessions, three times a week. SCY WAVES are encouraged and trained up to swim the USMS Virtual 1-Hour Swim along with one or two 2 championship swims in New England each year.
Starting with one or two triathlon friends, open water swimming at Narragansett Town Beach (NTB) became a regular practice, which has also grown. Today, anywhere from 20 to more than 100 swimmers attend those workouts regularly in the summer months.
Early years of swimming at NTB, Barber Pond, and other open water locations like Roger Wheeler Beach, was strictly by word of mouth or routine. But as the numbers grew, we established a swimming hotline to designate both time and place of the swims that would occur. In time, the phone tree became an email listserv, which eventually had 700 + emails subscribed. That has since evolved into a web site, swimtrirunman.org, where swimmers can find out about upcoming open water swims and other events.
I have participated in the Save the Bay Swim for more than 25 years and have coached the Leukemia/Lymphoma team in training for 7 years. I’ve been a part of the Laguna Mar Swim Camps run by Bob and Barb Crowder for six years, coaching Masters swimmers at the camp. I am still coaching triathletes and giving adult swim lessons.