Jacco Verhaeren looks like a man who's spent a fair bit of time under an Australian sun. Relaxed and smiling, he looks almost carefree. He's a happy man. And why shouldn't he be. He's been on a great voyage with one of the all-time greats of swimming - and it's not over yet.
When Pieter van den Hoogenband turned 29 last week at holding camp in Geelong, he said to Verhaeren: "ah, now you're officially half my life!" The coach is some ten years older than the swimmer, Verhaeren a green 23-year-old when a boy who had just celebrated his 14th birthday walked through the pool door.
"I think what helped us is that I grew up as a coach and he grew up as an athlete at the same time," said Verhaeren at Geelong, where the Dutch are sharing the pool with the US and Italy. "I started coaching him when he was 14 and at that time I was 23, a beginning coach. We did everything together, I tried to be every time one step ahead in my knowledge but in some areas he would later catch me up because he was then a big star."
Verhaeren spoke of the immense rewards to be had in coaching young swimmers and watching their development, helping them to grow straight. The bud, the bloom. Van den Hoogenband has proved himself to be something of a hardy perennial. "They have to learn everything. Then they get better and better and now he's one of most experience swimmers we have. He's not only important as a swimmer now but as a member of the team who shares his knowledge and experience and I can see that he enjoys this. He puts alot of energy into this."
Some of it he will keep in reserve for the final leg of his voyage. In Melbourne, the 200 metres is likely to be the better effort from Van den Hoogenband, Verhaeren believes.
Great news for all those looking forward to the four-lapper, including defending world champion Michael Phelps, who earlier in the week spoke of his keeness to race his Dutch rival for the first time since both finished behind Ian Thorpe in Athens, the Dutchman getting the silver lining.
"We're looking forward to the race too," said Verhaeren through a broad smile. "It should be good. Thorpe is not swimming anymore, unfortunately. I think there'll be a big clash between Pieter and Michael." His charge was looking "very good". he could step up from the 1:45 and 48.9 performances he achieved last time out rested. But Melbourne was merely a means to an end.
"We are still working on his dream of winning the three in a row," said Verhaeren, with a nod to the 2000 and 2004 Olympic titles notched up by van den Hoogenband over 100 metres. It didn't matter whether the programme meant that he might be the first man or the last man to do it (Grant Hackett, Gary Hall Jnr and Yana Klochkova are all aiming for a third successive victory in Beijing).
"Its all about trying to follow your dream," said the coach.
It had taken the Olympic blue-ribband champion longer to get back to best over 100 than 200 since he underwent surgery on his back in 2005. Verhaeren explained: "Its more a thing of real power. After surgery, the first year he couldn't do proper weight training, he couldn't do proper speed work in training. The first months were about getting his back in shape, conditioning, core strength. The focus was on getting him back in good aerobic condition and to build core strength so the back problem didn't reoccur."
Could he ever get back to that blistering 47.84, waters he wades in alone, the pack still paddling back over the 48sec horizon? "It's a bit too early to talk about world records on the 100 but he's getting there," said Verhaeren, who believes that Van den Hoogenband will not race below 48sec in Melbourne but doesn't rule out the possibility of a breakout performance from some of the young guns in the hunt.
"There are alot of newcomers of whom we don't know what to expect. Like Pieter in Sydney, people didn't know what to expect of him. There's Burnett, Jones, the young Australian (Sullivan). Some of those people have alot of speed and endurance and they can maybe surprise us.
"One thing we know for sure is that Pieter's record won't last 'til the end. One day or the other they will break his record. Our job is to get him in the best shape possible to do his very best here on 100 and 200 and try to achieve the goal we have at the Olympics," said Verhaeren.
The aim is more simple than the task but the coach believes that sticking to a strategy that he first used back in 2000 for the Sydney Games will reap rewards.
"It's always the same if we go to another country in another time zone. We get there very early because we want all race specific preparation in that country, to keep the swimmers away from the stress at home and to get them used to the time zone. This is 10 hours - the world is turned upside down.
"Some countries come in their taper phase because they don't want to be so far from home but I think its better to have the whole final race preparation in the time zone you compete in."
The reason why the Dutch pre-Beijing camp is already booked at a venue not far from Seoul in South Korea. Instead of heading to the Paris meet or the Japan Open this summer as many of the world's best will do, Van den Hoogenband will head out to Korea with Vehaeren for a pre-camp camp a year out from his attempt at securing one of the best seats in the pantheon of swimming greats.
In an era when talk of the greatness of Thorpe and Phelps had dominated the agenda, had Van den Hoogenband been a little overlooked? "That's the good thing right now in this era," said Verhaeren. "We had Ian Thorpe, Popov was still there for a moment, Pieter is there, Michael Phelps is there. They are different categories of swimmers. Like, Michael Phelps is so good at so many strokes and distances that it's hard to compare this.
"We're not looking for the same goal, winning as many gold medals as you can. We're looking for that one gold. The first dream was to win the gold medal at the Olympics, and that came with a world record. Now its about taking that to the end. What we are most proud of is that he swam in the 1996 Olympics and he's still swimming, still able to perform quality".
The secret of longevity, the coach said was Van den Hoogenband's nature and lifetsyle. "He's very consistent in everything he does. He's enjoying training and he's very conssistent in his lifetsyle, a healthy lifestyle, no stardom, no nothing. He's as simple now as he was when he started swimming.
"If you go into another direction - these (class of) swimmers are very aware of their dedication to training, what they eat, how they live. There's no other way to be in the pool for that long."
Whatever happens in Beijing, some business in the pool will remain on the shelf, unfinished if you like. Thorpe's 200m record, for instance. Could he ever get there? "I don't think so. From Pieter for sure not. From Michael I don't know. What I do know is its a very, very fast time to break, it came from one of the best races I ever saw. It's a big challenge for Michael to do this."
Is his swimmer Pieter the Great back home in Holland? "He's very well known there. There is no-one in Holland who doesn't know Pieter Van Den Hoogenband. I don't think they see him as the biggest star - that comes when you quit."
And when the champion does that, appearances on Dance with Stars, Stick Your Head in the Box and Guess the Celebrity (no such show exists but you get my drift), and all those other vehicles for people drunk on fame, are most unlikely.
"Pieter leads a quiet life. If you want to be on television every day you can be but ..." And there, Verhaeren leaves it. As Beijing bids farewell to the world and Pieter van den Hoogenband next year, the lights, cameras, action will all have been done in the pool, where and when it counted.
