Sydney Goldberg makes the All-Section swim team as Blind Brook Lady Trojan swimmer without a pool

December 6, 2023 at 11:36 p.m.

Blind Brook High School senior Sydney Goldberg competes in the butterfly leg on a relay in the New York State Public High School Swimming and Diving Championships in Rochester. She made the All-Section team and qualified for states even though Blind Brook doesn't have a pool. (Courtesy photo of Sydney Goldberg)

Blind Brook doesn't have a swimming pool or a swim team of its own, but that didn't stop Lady Trojans senior Sydney Goldberg from being named to Westchester's All-Section swim team and competing in the New York State Public High School Athletic Association Swimming and Diving Championships in Rochester against the best swimmers in the entire state because only the elite meet the qualification standards.

That kind of rare aquatic feat doesn't come easily.

Sydney did it with her own watery version of the Goldberg variations. She made Westchester's All-Star swim team because of her ability to race in the 200 IM and the 100 Fly, meaning she could race with the area's best in the sprints, backstroke, breast stroke and butterfly, the latter the event that helped her make the All-Section team while her versatility enabled her to compete as a member of one of the top 15 200-meter medley and 200 freestyle medley relay teams in the state.

The missing second

Earning a place on those relay teams was especially important to Goldberg because the teams missed making it into the states by a second last year.

So beating the clock this time around and qualifying for the states has been one of the crowning moments of her senior year.

She accomplished all that and more as a member of a merged Rye/Rye Neck and Blind Brook team that also included four of her Blind Brook classmates: sophomores Emilia Boccini and Emily Golodnikev and juniors Rachel Horn and Emily Riley.

But Goldberg was the only senior in that Blind Brook contingent.

And Goldberg was the only one who has been swimming competitively with the Empire Swim Club—one of Westchester's top aquatic talent incubators—since she was eight.

    Blind Brook’s Sydney Goldberg stands on the podium at the New York State Public High School Swimming and Diving Championships in Rochester. Just making it to the state competition as a sectional champion is a significant accomplishment.
 Courtesy of Sydney Goldberg   

At ease in pool

"I don't know why, I just took naturally to the water and felt at ease in a swimming pool almost from the time I took my first swimming lesson," she recalled.

And that's a good thing because she spends a lot of time in the water.

Goldberg and her four Blind Brook counterparts spent about 40 minutes each weekday commuting roundtrip to the Hommocks Pool Complex in Mamaroneck to work out with the merged Rye/Rye Neck/Blind Brook team from around 3:30 to 5 p.m. under the watchful eye of veteran head coach Katie Konopka.

Konopka helped Goldberg get up to speed in a variety of events and strokes but urged her to concentrate on the fly during her senior year.

That paid off with Goldberg earning the All-Section designation in that event and it made her a standout in the IM and freestyle relays as well.

On the run again

Her parents, both recreational runners, encouraged her every step of the way.

And that takes a lot of steps for a couple of reasons.

Now that the high school scholastic swim season is over, Goldberg still swims more than two hours a day, six days a week, from 5 to 7:30 p.m. with the Empire club team out of Ardsley with her eye on such upcoming events as the Christmas and Winter Classics.

But before she leaves for swim team practice, she also works out with the Lady Trojans Track & Field team, as she has for all four of her high school years, specializing in the 1,600 meters, the metric equivalent of the one-mile run. She runs the distance in the mid 5:20s. It’s a grueling event that has helped build up her lung and endurance power, both of which help her as she kicks towards the finish in her multiple swimming events.

Eyes college pool

Between Goldberg's swimming, T&F and such extracurriculars as the robotics, science and arts clubs, after studying hard to get the grades that make her a solid college recruit, there isn't time for much of anything else.

Goldberg hasn't decided on a college yet, but she has been corresponding with several coaches and hopes there is a college butterfly in her future. Even as she continues working on her Goldberg variations to speed up her times and versatility in her other swimming strokes. Maybe even breaking five minutes for the mile before she graduates. At least she has a track to run on at Blind Brook, a school without a pool or swim team. But that hasn't stopped Goldberg from making All-Section and qualifying for the states as a swimmer. And the best may be yet to come in college.