Peirsol does Newport Harbor proud

Danette Goulet

NEWPORT BEACH - While 17-year-old Aaron Peirsol swam his way to an

Olympic silver medal Thursday, the world and his fellow classmates at

Newport Harbor High School watched intensely.

“It was really cool,” said Peter Belden, who has known Aaron since

they were in Junior Lifeguards together. “At first I thought he was the

second in the United States -- I had no idea he was a medal contender.”

This may seem a surprising revelation for one of his close friends,

but according to Peter’s sister, Katherine -- another great friend of

Aaron’s -- Aaron did not talk about his swimming much with his high

school friends.

“He’d never brag or anything,” she said. “Ever since they started

calling him an Olympic hopeful, everyone’s been asking him when he was

going to be in the Olympics. But he’s always been really humble.”

Although he now lives in Irvine to be closer to his training grounds,

Aaron will be a junior at Newport Harbor in the fall.

His silver-medal winning time of 1 minute, 57.35 seconds in the men’s

200-meter backstroke Thursday in Sydney was the second fastest time he

has posted in his young career. He finished .59 seconds behind world

record holder Lenny Krazelburg.

Although his former swim coach at Newport Harbor saw his potential,

even he did not realize the magnitude of Aaron’s ability.

“He won every thing he raced in, so we knew something special was

brewing, but we didn’t know it was this big,” said Brian Kreutzkamp, the

swimming and water polo coach at Newport Harbor High School.

Now that Aaron has done everyone proud, his friends just want him to

come home. Peter is hoping to play a little water polo with him, and

Katherine just wants to see her friend.

“I miss him a lot,” she said. “He’s been gone a long time -- like a

month already.”