The Iceman makes the grade

NELSPRUIT – Known as the Iceman, the 13 year old Mpumalanga swimming sensation sits quietly one side, eyes fixed firmly on his rubix cube. “There has to be a way to figure this thing out,” he said completely oblivious to the urgency of a newspaper interview.

Jacey Bekker is a somewhat introverted young man. Unlike many of his peers, Jacey spends most of his time in the company of his own thoughts, with his closest friend being his mom, Nelspruit police captain Ronel Bekker. But what really disquishes him from the average teen is his exceptional talent in the water. This season he became the first swimmer in the province to reach the Level 3 National qualification which enables him to participate in national swimming galas of the highest standard.

“In our country you can only compete in international events after the age of sixteen and reaching Level 3 is pretty much the highest you can go before that,” he explained. “This is also why I spend so much time training and trying to perfect my style so that in March next year, I can make the podium at National Level 3 champs in Cape Town.”

It is said that swimming is a sport and all the others are games, and that if it were any easier it would be called rugby. When looking at the amount of hours a swimmer of Jacey’s caliber spends in the water, that tongue in cheeck statement could very well ring true. “I spend about four hours each day in the water which equates to around 50 kilometres per week.” In an olympic size swimming pool like Van Riebeeck Park, that distance translates into 1 000 lengths. Per week. And thats excluding weekends when they swim galas.

Jacey specialises in the butterfly and freestyle disciplines of the sport, more specifically the 50 and 100 metre events. He currently boasts a time of 32,82 seconds for the 50m Fly and 1:02:00 for the 100 metres freestyle. “I still get nervous around water at times, which is ironic I know, but it dates back to my childhood when I nearly drowned.”

At age one, Jacey fell in the water at the beach while on holiday with his mom, and developed an intense phobia for water. Because they owned a pool at the time, mom Ronel knew it would be in their own interest to get her son “swimming safe” and so enrolled him into a local swimming school. It was only much later however that youngster worked up the courage to climb back into the pool and the rest – as they say – is history.

The province will have their eyes fixed on this young man in the years to come as he aspires towards Olympic gold in the future. “My first goal is gold in Cape Town, after that, well the Olympics of course!”