Athlete Spotlight: James Wood High School Swimmer Ping Lin

ROBERT NIEDZWIECKI | The Winchester Star

James Wood High School 18-year-old senior

Sport: Swimming. Main events: 100 freestyle, 50 freestyle, 100 breaststroke

Parents: Hanh Pham and Ronnie Youngblood

Hometown: Winchester (moved from Vietnam four years ago)

What do you love about swimming: I like seeing how I can improve in my events, and beating my own personal-best times.

Most memorable moment in swimming: Last year at the conference meet, I beat my own personal best by three seconds in the 100 breaststroke. I beat my personal best in my previous meet, so I didn’t think I could drop that much time. It meant a lot to do that.

Three people you can have dinner with, dead or alive: My best friend [James Wood senior swimmer] Sam McCarthy, my friend [junior] Daniel Woodrum on the swim team, and [former James Wood swimmer] Dean Ludwig. We’ve spent a lot of time together in class and outside of school. Dean was my mentor in swimming. My sophomore year was my first year swimming competitively. He showed me what I was doing wrong with my starts, and helped me improve.

Food you can’t do without: French fries. I like getting them from McDonald’s.

Favorite superhero: The Flash. I like his personality. With everything he deals with in his personal life, he’s a real person I can relate to.

Favorite teacher: Maria Chavez. She was my ESL (English as a Second Language) teacher for my ninth- and tenth-grade years. She helped me improve my English a lot as far as speaking and writing. Especially my freshman year, I had a lot of difficulty in class because it was a new environment for me after moving here. She spent a lot of time with me to help me with homework or material in class I didn’t understand. She helped me pronounce words that I either didn’t know how to pronounce, or pronounced wrong. She also taught me to not give up on anything, and try my best.

Favorite athlete: Manchester United striker Wayne Rooney

Favorite team: Manchester United

Favorite movie: “Jurassic Park”

Favorite TV show: “House”

Favorite ice cream flavor: Vanilla

Plans after high school: I‘m planning to go to Lord Fairfax for my first two years, and then go to JMU for computer science. I’ve been really passionate about computers in general since I was a kid. I want to learn more about computers and I’m looking forward to seeing what they can do in the future.

— Compiled by Robert Niedzwiecki