Nareg Minassian swims to advance to U.S. Olympic trials |

Yale swimmer Nareg Minassian is forging his own path in the water, something his parents knew he would do from a young age. Minassian is fresh off a successful sophomore season that saw him qualify for the U.S. Olympic Trials.

“I started swimming when I was three years old. I started swimming because I was on holiday with my parents and I thought I couldn’t get out of the water, but I couldn’t swim yet,” Minassian told weekly“So my parents said, ‘We have to get this kid to learn to swim.’ So as soon as we got back from Cancun, they signed me up for swimming lessons. I joined my first swim team when I was five. From that point on, swimming became my main sport.”

Minassian grew up in Newton, Mass. “I grew up in a very Armenian family. My dad is very Armenian, my mom is very Armenian. They were both Boy Scouts. They both grew up in the Armenian Youth Organization in Beirut. As soon as you walk into my house, you can tell it’s Armenian – Armenian rugs, Armenian paintings all over the walls, Armenian music playing in the kitchen. I really grew up in a very Armenian family, and from the time I was very young, my parents always put Armenia first,” he said.

Minassian learned to read and write in Armenian at a young age and was involved in groups including AYF from an early age. He says his Armenian identity has helped him get to where he is today. “I think it has had a huge impact on where I am today,” he said. “I can attribute 50 percent of my success to the Armenian community that I’ve been a part of.”

Minassian admits that he never swam for school growing up, instead swimming competitively for clubs. “My first club team was in Pennsylvania, where I used to live, and when we moved to Boston, I joined another club called Crimson Aquatics,” he explains. “I’ve been a member of that club since 2011.” Minassian is now an alumnus of his swim club.

As Minassian grew up, he discovered that swimming was a demanding sport. Not only was swimming a challenge in the water, but Minassian and his family also had to overcome additional difficulties to achieve his dream.

“It was a 30-minute drive from my house, so all my friends would be doing sports at school after school, and I had to go far away. But it was worth it because you need good swimming facilities; you need new coaches. And my high school wasn’t going to have good training, so I had to make sacrifices,” Minassian said.

Early on, Minassian knew swimming was more than just a recreational sport for him. “My breakthrough performance was when I was 14, in my first travel team meet,” he recalls. “That was in Indiana, and I finished in the top 20 for my age group at national meets multiple times. I don’t think I was even 14 years old when people were like, OK, this kid is serious, I’m going to be serious too.”

Year after year, Minassian’s swimming skills continued to improve. After his high school swimming career ended, Minassian competed in the 50m freestyle, 100m freestyle, and 100m breaststroke, and was accepted into the Yale University swim team. Academics were always a priority in Minassian’s family, and when the opportunity to attend an Ivy League school came up, Minassian jumped at the chance and gave it his all.

“I knew Yale was the right place for me. When I was at Harvard, Princeton, the Ivy League and Stanford and Cal, I knew the team would ultimately make the decision for me because swimming is a very tough sport. It’s a very personal sport, but the best thing is the support you get from other people on the team. I found that support on the Yale team, and that’s why I chose Yale,” Minassian said.

Minassian recalled the day he learned he was going to Yale.

“It was a very cold January day in my junior year, and I told them in the car that I was getting in. I went home and told my parents, and they were ecstatic. They were all first-generation immigrants, going to school in Lebanon. It was the best news they had ever heard. It was a great day. When the acceptance letter came in and the acceptance was confirmed, it was an even better day,” Minassian shared.

Now, Minassian has completed his first two seasons on the Yale swim team. He admits that his first season was all about adjusting to a new rhythm of life, but he found his footing. “I definitely just wanted to contribute more to the team,” he said. “I wanted to score points in the Ivy League. I wanted to place. I wanted to get all my personal bests, and I did all of that. It was really cool. I worked really hard. I kind of understood my situation, so I knew what to do.”

Minassian continues to learn and grow as a sophomore. “I went through a season where I didn’t really have to figure things out. Now, I feel like I have a good understanding of how the season works, how I can manage my school time, my free time, my practice time,” Minassian added.

Towards the end of his sophomore year, Minassian had the opportunity to qualify for the U.S. Olympic Trials. “Qualifying for the Trials was a crazy experience,” he said. “It was at the end of the Ivy League Championships, and they had the time trial on Sunday. So the competition ended on Saturday, and the qualifying round was on Sunday.”

Minassian had no idea he had a chance to qualify.

“I didn’t expect that I would qualify, and I was so shocked when I did. I was so excited because it’s literally the highest honor in swimming. Once you qualify for the trials, you qualify for every meet except the Olympics. It’s the biggest national meet in the United States, and it was a surreal experience. I couldn’t believe it,” Minassian explained.

The U.S. Olympic Trials are no ordinary swimming meet. Minassian said the U.S. Trials at Lucas Oil Stadium were one of the highlights of his career.

“I never thought I would swim in a soccer stadium, but they were so well set up for that event. They provided us with so many things. We had therapy dogs, massages, unlimited food; they had different stations where you could do all kinds of activities. Cold plunge pools, hot tubs, saunas, steam rooms. Unlimited amenities to make sure the kids who qualified knew they made it,” Minassian shared.

The U.S. Olympic Swimming Trials were held June 15-23. Minassian competed in the 50-meter freestyle and 100-meter freestyle time trials June 17-18. Although Minassian did not qualify for the Paris Olympics, he said the experience was invaluable. Now, he is preparing to start his junior year with a clear goal in mind. “We are currently ranked third in the Ivy League. We have been right behind Harvard, Princeton and us, and we are trying to get second place. We think we have a chance to beat Princeton this year,” he said.

Minassian is a proud Armenian. He inquired about the possibility of representing Armenia in swimming competitions, but it proved to be a challenge. “I actually thought about representing Armenia before the beginning of the year. But the problem is that I have to represent Armenia at the World Championships in 2022, so obviously I can’t go back and do that,” he explained.

Minassian attributes his success today to his upbringing in Armenia. He says his success in swimming has inspired young Armenians to take up sports they otherwise wouldn’t. “A lot of my family’s younger friends have their kids learning to swim. We’ve seen a lot of people improve because of me, and it’s honestly a very cool thing,” he said.

By Jason Tahtajian

armenian weekly