Paityn Roberts (’27) swims laps across the pool, doing the “freestyle” stroke, before the team’s Tuesday afternoon practice. You can find her most often at the James P. Gills YMCA competition pool. “I train about 12-16 hours a week, mostly with the team. I do dumbbells and also do club and school practices, and sometimes on the weekends on my own,” Roberts said. Photo by Aerial Stonis

At 12 years old, Paityn Roberts (‘27) started competitively swimming at James P. Gills YMCA’s PYP club swim team. Since then she has been constantly working to improve and is now on their highest swim level, “platinum”. As a freshman, she is on the girls Mitchell swim team and is already proving herself an asset by winning almost every single race in her heat this season. Her passion for the sport is what drives her to do her best.

“I think the kind of devotion and time that swimming takes, and how you really have to love the sport to get into it is why I love it. With all the hard work that we put into it and everything that the sport gives: the adrenaline, the competition, it makes you love it even more,” Roberts said.

Roberts trains 12-16 hours a week with her school and club practices combined. She competes in freestyle stroke events, swimming the 500-yard distance race, as well as sprint races that are 50-yards and 100-yards, and the 100-yard butterfly. Roberts swims almost everyday multiple times a day to prepare for these races. Her club swim coach, Jeremy Marzicola has been coaching her for two years now, and has seen how much she’s improved.

“Paityn is a hard worker, and self motivated, so she’s had a pretty steady trajectory of success. She’s gone from being a bubble guppy to a state championship level age group swimmer.  It has been a good progression,” Marzicola said.

Roberts’ goal for this season is to make it to the state championship. Her ultimate goal is to earn a full-ride scholarship for Florida Gulf Coast University’s division 1 swim team.

“I’ve already been scouted for some D3 and D2 teams. It would be nice to swim in college since that is something I would like to pursue, ” Roberts said.

As Roberts continues training for her races, she stays motivated by reminding herself: “You’re only as good as you make yourself,” Roberts said.