Swimmer Riley Gaines represented UK better than even her coach originally anticipated

Riley Gains won 11 SEC medals, including four golds, during her Kentucky career. (Photo by UK Athletics)

Senior Riley Gaines ended her Kentucky swimming career with 11 SEC Championship medals. Four were gold — three individuals and one relay. She earned All-American honors and was fifth in the 200-yard freestyle at the NCAA Championships this year.

She still remembers coming from Gallatin, Tenn., for her recruiting visit and what UK coach Lars Jorgensen told her.

“He said I was not a fantastic recruit. He said, ‘You are okay, but you are more walk-on material. Maybe you can squeeze into a C-final at SEC.’ It’s amazing how far I have come,” Gaines said. “I told my mom I wanted to go home when he said that to me. My face was super red. Now we are close enough we can joke about it.

“He develops these tactics that people feed off of and knows what motivates freshmen. It can be tough but he said things to fire me up. You could look at his comments as hurtful and mean but I know it was just tough love. He would trash talk you but that was part of what makes this special for me.”

Gaines won both the 200 freestyle and 200 butterfly at the SEC Championships and was pleased with how she did at nationals.

“It’s typically hard for a swimmer to go back to back like you have to do with the SEC and NCAA only a few weeks apart,” Gaines said. “It’s hard to build yardage back up and then come down again for NCAA. I did not have a ton of expectations for the NCAA. I did want to finish with All-America honors, and did that. I think I represented UK at the highest level I could.”

“My time (in the 200 free) was not fantastic but after getting seventh last year, I wanted to prove I could do better and I got fifth. I could have done a little better if I had been on my A game and maybe got second or third. But the girl who won, I could not have gone that time.”

Now she is enjoying the “retired life” while waiting to see if she’s accepted into dental school at UK.

“It is definitely weird having so much time. I have gone from having this set routine that you couldn’t stray from the past 15 years. Now there’s no one telling me what to do and no set instructions,” Gaines said.

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Gaines will join myself, Tim Estes and Molly Wise on WPBK (102.9 FM, wpbkfm.com) Thursday from 7:30-8 a.m. EST.