Tyler Zarbock '25 Recruiting Profile

I live for the sport of swimming and I am always willing and determined to push myself to the next level. Something that makes me different is that at the age of 16 I was in a major car accident, in which I broke my left collarbone, left ankle, and roughly 14 vertebrae. My doctors told me that I might never swim again, and I would be lucky to ever recover fully, but I never let their words stop me. Most people would take time off to recover, however I most definitely am not most people, and the day that they released me from the hospital I went to practice wearing a back brace and riding a knee scooter. I would end up going to all but three practices from August all the way through to April, and the three days that I missed were because I was in the Hospital. I knew that I couldn't touch the water but to even see the water brought me peace and helped to ease the pain. By the three week mark I was back in the water working on sculling and doing what I could. Then by the six week mark I was back to swimming full strokes, and by the two month mark I was already racing. Throughout the whole recovery process my coach, Sean, and I never thought about where I would be at the end of the season because we both knew that I was not ready to let this injury be an excuse for why I did not reach the next level, and instead it only drove the desire to reach the Futures level of Swimming even more. When we got to our Sectionals meet in March, I knew that even with the injury I was faster than I ever was before, and mentally I was in the best place I have ever been. At that Sectionals meet, which was only 142 days after I suffered all these "season-ending" injuries, I made my first ever finals at Sectionals, went best times in all 7 of my events, and made my first ever Futures Cut. I knew that it was going to be the toughest challenge, both mentally and physically, that I ever had to face recovering from this car crash but I learned that I am willing to take on the biggest challenges imaginable just to reach my goals.