![\"Dalton\"](\"https:\/\/www.umw.edu\/greatminds\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/20\/2016\/09\/SwimCoach_HP-1024x413.jpg\")
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But first, the beginning.<\/p>\n
Growing up in the Midwest, Herendeen tackled a series of clunky prosthetics but played the same sports as his siblings \u2013 basketball, football, and soccer. In the water, he excelled. Despite his disability, he\u2019d made the state finals in high school and earned a scholarship to the University of Indiana. So when his coach suggested he look into the Paralympics, Herendeen balked. Competing against handicapped swimmers seemed like a step backward.<\/p>\n
But he came around.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought I was going to destroy these kids,\u201d said Herendeen, who was disarmed by the wheelchairs and prosthetics that scattered the deck at that first 2008 meet. \u201cBut they were phenomenal. I got my butt kicked.\u201d<\/p>\n
He licked his wounds and set his sights on 2012. For the next four years, he would eat, sleep, and breathe swimming, and it paid off. But despite his sturdy performance in London, there would be no medals to bring home.<\/p>\n
Distraught, Herendeen no longer wanted to look<\/em> at a pool much less swim in one. That\u2019s when he got a call from the folks at Bates College Swim Camp, which UMW\u2019s Brethauer co-founded. They had seen a feature on him in the NCAA magazine Champion<\/em> and asked him to join their coaching team.<\/p>\n Working with kids turned things around, pumped Herendeen up, and pulled him back to the pool. Back at U-Indy, he broke lots of records and became captain of the school\u2019s Division II team. When he graduated, Brethauer asked him to coach at Mary Washington and promised to train him for Rio.<\/p>\n Then, at last year\u2019s world championships in Scotland, something went wrong. Herendeen blew out his right knee, the good one, and had to have surgery. With Brethauer\u2019s encouragement, he pressed through the pain of recovery and continued to train.<\/p>\n The two would spend hours each day in the Goolrick Hall pool or in the long-course lanes at the Jeff Rouse Family Swim and Sport Center, where Herendeen coaches the Fredericksburg Stingrays. Together, they\u2019d focus on the technique and strategy he would need in Brazil, where he\u2019s slated to compete in the 400-meter freestyle, 200-meter individual medley, 100-meter butterfly, 100-meter breaststroke and 400-meter medley relay.<\/p>\n Four years ago, at the Paralympic Games in London, Herendeen said, he was star struck. Just getting there was enough, and he soaked it all in. This time around he wants more.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve accomplished everything I want to in my career; the only thing I have not done is to medal,\u201d he said. \u201cWhether I do or I don\u2019t, what I want to be able to do \u2026 is say, \u2018Dalton, you gave it everything you had.\u2019 \u201c<\/p>\n