A Highlander’s Journey into Nevada’s Pool
Reporters Kailee Bryant and Dominic Gutierrez report on Scarlett Ferris, a freshman swim and dive athlete at UNR from Scotland who talks about her successful first season as well as her transition to the Silver state.
Although the season is over for the Nevada swim and dive team, Scottish student-athlete record-breaking swimmer Scarlett Ferris doesn’t take time off. Lombardi Gym, the home of the swim and dive pool, is where Ferris spends the majority of her time when she is not studying or in class.
Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays Ferris usually finds herself lifting from 5:45 a.m. to 6:45 a.m., at swim practice from 7:00 a.m. to 8:00 am, and at another practice from 2:30 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.
Tuesdays and Thursdays consist of practice from 2:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. But the job is not done there. She’s also there on Saturdays from 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m.
Practice usually begins with a warm-up session consisting of stretches and light exercises to prevent injuries and prepare the body for the intense workout ahead.
Ferris then enters the pool and focuses on various aspects of her technique, such as stroke mechanics, breathing patterns, and turns. She may swim laps of different strokes.
As a competitor, Ferris participates in the 100-meter backstroke and freestyle. In February, at a meet in Houston, she broke the Mountain West Championship meet record with a time of 51.49 for her backstroke specialty race.
After coming from Fife, Scotland, the transition to Reno, Nevada has been full of adventure outside the pool as well, with opportunities for hiking and plunging in chilly lake water with her friends on the beach side of Tahoe.
Fife, where she grew up, is a Scottish mecca for outdoor activities, with a charming coastline, and beautiful fishing villages that dot its coast.
At home, Ferris would spend lots of time walking with her family and her dog around her town, walking on the shores of St. Andrews Beach, and taking day trips around her city with her friends.
Ferris has been swimming in competitions for 10 years, and has participated in other sports, including basketball, tennis, and dance.
With swimming being such a demanding sport on the body, Ferris had to choose and drop other sports despite her abilities in all.
“I would do double [swim] sessions, I was doing three weight sessions, it was a lot,” Ferris said. “So physically as a 13–14 year-old in high school, I can’t do that and another sport.”
When she was 17, she talked to a few schools, such as Illinois and Florida. After graduating high school, she decided to stay home for an extra year and wasn’t sure if swimming was actually right for her.
That changed when Ferris was at the gym and received a DM on Instagram from an assistant coach at the University of Nevada, Reno. She didn’t believe it at first because of how informal and relaxed it felt.
“I was like, this is so fake,” Ferris said. “Like, it’s your Instagram, why are they not emailing?”
She hopped on a Zoom call that night with coaches at UNR, and a month later she flew out to Reno for recruitment.
That transition from Fife to Reno wasn’t the easiest adjustment. Although Scotland and the U.S. have some similarities, Ferris said there are a lot of differences she’s still working on.
“Something I really struggle with was the lack of independence because I’m in a different country across the world,” Ferris said. “So it’s Independence but having to rely on people to drive me places or ‘hey, can you take me to the store? Hey, what is this?’ I recently had to file for taxes. And I was like, what is this?”
Luckily, other athletes on the swim and dive team are international as well, and the swimmers are there to help each other.
Two teammates are from Scotland, one from New Zealand, one from Great Britain, one from Spain, one from South Africa, one from Slovenia, and one from Mexico. Ferris appreciates the connections that she has made with other international athletes because it helps her adjust better.
“It’s nice to have other people with you that are going through it,” Ferris said.
Ferris will take time away from Nevada to fly back home to Scotland this summer, while still training for the upcoming season. Ferris hopes she can break more records as a student athlete and some day in the future make it into the Olympics.
