Pablo Torre

It was time to choose a college where I could continue excelling in my athletic career.

And what she describes is this very fond memory of being almost relentlessly recruited by the head swimming coach at the University of Kentucky who sold Riley Gaines at one point on attending a Kentucky basketball game.

Don't judge.

This was when Kentucky men's basketball was actually good and not losing to St.

Peter's Peacocks.

Never in a million years did I think I'd actually fall in love with the school, which, of course, I did.

And that annoying coach who kept calling and emailing me, he became and still is one of my best friends.

The coach that became one of her best friends, as she calls him, the relentless swimming coach that recruited her, what was his name?

That coach was Lars Jorgensen.

Riley calls him Coach Lars, so we can call him that too.

He was a former college swimmer.

He made it to the Olympics in 1988.

Came back, coached D1 in Louisiana, Ohio, Tennessee.

And by the time Riley got to Kentucky in 2018, her freshman year, he'd been head coach of the Wildcats there for four years.

And they were doing great under him.

They were, by all accounts, on the rise.

In the beginning of freshman year, he continually addressed me as a loft.

I had no idea what this meant, and I never questioned it until one day I mustered up the courage to ask.

I was told it means lack of effing talent.

Ah, cool.