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Haberer is Vancouver-bound taking on Canada in Special Olympics Summer Games

July 9, 2014   ·   0 Comments

By Jeff Doner

From July 8 to 12, athletes from all over Canada are headed to Vancouver for the 2014 Special Olympics Summer Games and Aurora’s Mary Haberer will be right there in the thick of it.

Haberer is no stranger to the Special Olympics, having participated in plenty of regional and provincial competitions in swimming and softball over the years.

Now she is taking her talents to the national stage and the Aurora Master Ducks swimmer couldn’t be happier.

“I’m nervous because it is my very first time,” she recently told The Auroran. “It is for the Nationals and yes, it’s the first time I will visit Vancouver.”

Haberer has been swimming for about 15 years and will be competing in the 100m freestyle, the 200m freestyle, 400m freestyle and doing the 25m butterfly, which has become one of her favourites.

Haberer’s coach, Lloyd Brown, has known her for about seven years, but the two have been training intensely for about a year.

“This is huge for her,” Brown said. “She’s been excited about it since she found out in November that she had qualified for it.”

The two have become good friends over the years and Brown said he is proud to see her take the next step to the national level after seeing her work so hard in the pool.

“She has incredible drive and she is driven to do things and likes to do everything,” he said. “She never admits to being tired, she’ll do a huge workout and then say she’s ready for more. She’s always smiling and always happy and when she goes into things, she goes full force. When she does something, she doesn’t do it halfway.”

Haberer has been training hard over the past few months, spending plenty of time in both the gym and pool. She goes to the gym for two hours about six times a week and then in the pool with the Aurora Master Ducks every week.

Brown said when it comes to being prepared for a big match, Haberer is always ahead of the game, making his job easy.

“I don’t have to do a whole lot,” he said. “Mentally I try to just get her ready for the race, but I don’t really have to do much to get her ready, she’s always ready on her own. All I have to do is get her focused a bit more sometimes. She’s totally driven.”

Helping her get ready for competition, Haberer recently took part in the first ever swim meet hosted by the Special Ducks in Aurora.

In total there were about 25 people from Aurora and a few from Newmarket that took part.

But make no mistake; she is focused on doing her best this week in Vancouver.

         

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