Kylie Masse has had plenty of time to ponder, well, time. It’s a commodity usually so cut and dry for swimmers: Hours in the pool adding up to months of preparation, all to translate into tenths or hundredths of a second of improvement.
Even before the coronavirus pandemic ramped up its global spread in March, Masse felt a version of the time dilation rendered by the Olympic year. Then all the hectic speed of 2020 came to a screeching halt two weeks before Masse and her fellow Canadians were to test themselves at Olympic Trials. And then swimming-free weeks later, Masse is trying to find the silver lining of the disruptions.
“As soon as it hit January 1, 2020, we were just on fast-forward until mid-March when the pandemic started escalating,” she said last week. “I feel like those months flew by and I’m just really looking forward to having this extra time to try to continue to get better.”
Like many others, Masse has found social isolation to be a bumpy road. She’s thrown herself into hobbies like cooking and gardening, and accelerated her coursework with unexpected free time, bunkered at home with family in Ontario.
But even while not in the water, the 24-year-old Olympian has her eye on how she can prepare, physically and mentally, to perform best when she gets to compete again.
“You never have a perfect race. There’s things that you can always improve on,” she said. “The sport is measured to such a small degree, and hundredths of a second matter. So there’s always little things and habits to break and little things to improve on. I’m really just looking at that extra time to get better and see how fast I can be.”
A time to reset
Masse could be an authority on the perfect race, because she’s closer to it than most will ever be. The two-time reigning World Champion in the women’s 100-meter backstroke, Masse has staked a claim as one of her generation’s best backstrokers. She set the world record at the 2017 World Championships at 58.10 seconds, taking down Gemma Spofforth’s tech-suit record from Rome in 2009, the oldest standing women’s world record at the time. Though the mark has since changed hands to a pair of Americans – first Kathleen Baker, then Regan Smith – Masse holds five of the top 10 swims all-time and seven of the top 15, per FINA’s database. She also successfully defended her World Championship in 2019, showing off her clutch gene.
Kylie Masse; Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick
Masse also holds the Canadian record in the 200 back. She has five career Worlds medals plus golds at the World University Games, the Commonwealth Games and the Pan Pacific Championships. With the progress she’s made over the last four years, it wouldn’t be a surprise for Masse to improve on the bronze medal won in Rio in 2016.
COVID-19 has changed the path to Tokyo. Masse has been out of the water since Swimming Canada’s High Performance Centre in Toronto shut down in mid-March. She has stayed connected to a strength and conditioning regimen via remote classes and dipped into other fitness areas, from online barre and yoga classes to family bike rides, anything to keep fresh mentally and physically.
The swimming sabbatical has altered Masse’s academic calendar, too. She is aiming to graduate from the University of Toronto in December with a degree in kinesiology. But instead of taking the four courses she needs in the fall, after what she hoped was a successful Tokyo Games, she’s splitting the difference with two online summer courses to lighten her next semester as training (hopefully) resumes.
Things could be a lot worse, Masse points out. And she’s thankful for what she does have.
“I’ve just tried to keep perspective and just try to stay positive the best I can,” she said. “I just keep thinking of how grateful I am to be spending time right now with my family and just to be grateful that I can go outside … and be grateful for the little things.”
A time to lead
At 24, Masse isn’t old by swimming standards. But she’s experienced beyond her years, at the forefront of a cresting wave of Canadian talents. That has furnished a leadership role that Masse has embraced.
Flying the Flag – Canadian backstroke ace Kylie Masse – Photo Courtesy: Ian MacNicol
In a conversation with Swimming World in April, Canadian High Performance Director John Atkinson cited Masse as one of the most vocal participants on an athletes’ call. The federation was soliciting feedback on what athletes needed to navigate the crisis, and Masse was one of those taking the lead to encourage others to speak up and check in regularly.
With national teamers spread through the country, Masse volunteered as a communications hub. She’s grateful to Swimming Canada for continuing to connect athletes and providing resources to cushion the blow of isolation.
“I know how much it helped me being able to call up a friend or FaceTime a friend and do a workout online together,” Masse said. “It was really nice to have that kind of social interaction as well as motivation. That was something that I mentioned on the call with the national team members, like, hey everybody, I’ll always be here if you want to call or FaceTime workout or not even work out but just chat.”
The camaraderie could unlock the next level for a burgeoning program. The national team got an overhaul after a disappointing 2012 Olympics that didn’t yield a single women’s medal. In Rio 2016, it netted four individual medals at the Games, highlighted by Penny Oleksiak’s tie for gold in the 100 freestyle with Simone Manuel, plus a pair of relay bronzes. By the 2019 World Championships, Canada claimed five individual medals (golds from Masse and Maggie MacNeil) and bronze in all three relays.
The success is built on young swimmers like Sydney Pickrem (22), Emily Overholt (22), Kelsey Wog (21), Rebecca Smith (20), MacNeil (20), Kayla Sanchez (19), Taylor Ruck (19) and Oleksiak (still somehow just 19). That posits Masse as a veteran, and she’s taken on that mantle wholeheartedly.
“Amongst the national team, we have such a great connection and respect for each other although we may be spread out across the entire country,” Masse said. “I’m not necessarily close to anyone now geographically that I’ve been talking to, and we are all in our own programs during the normal training season. And because swimming is our whole entire life and it pretty much all revolves around that and with that being gone right now, it’s been really valuable to just to try to keep in touch with each other. … So it’s really just trying to stay connected and lean on each other and know when it’s safe to do so, we’ll all be back in and ready to take on the year.”
Her aid to others begins with absorbing the uncertainty of the moment. She thinks her experience in the last Olympic cycle helps, as much as anything can. It’s another aspect in which she’s had time to hone her outlook.
“It’s just how you’re handling the current situation we’re in and how you’re handling your thoughts and emotions towards everything,” she said. “Having the experience with dealing with similar things, emotions and nerves that you would experience at a major championship have definitely taught me lessons and I’m probably using them right now without even thinking about it.”