His summer is going swimmingly.
New York City-based swimmer Adell Sabovic, 22, competed Tuesday in the 100-meter freestyle at the 2024 Paris Summer Olympic Games, representing his family’s home country of Kosovo.
“I had a lot of fun doing that and a very long road to get to Paris,” Sabovic said in a post-race interview. “So I tried my best to savor the moment.”
Sabovic, a graduate of Eleanor Roosevelt High School who’s entering his final year at Princeton University, launched his athletic career at Asphalt Green’s free neighborhood swim meet on the Upper East Side about a decade ago.
His future coach, David Rodriguez, noted you can never know at that early age who will become an Olympian. But he said he recognized Sabovic’s raw talent and love of the sport, and recruited him to the Asphalt Green Unified Aquatics swim team, known as AGUA — where Sabovic still trains over college breaks and each summer. Over his 12 years competing with AGUA, Sabovic secured records at regional and national competitions, before qualifying for the Olympics.
“He’s a home-grown kid,” said Rodriguez, senior director of aquatics at Asphalt Green. “He’s been part of our program since he was 10 years old.”
Sabovic had a lot of early success in his swimming career, according to his coach — and had to push through moments during the pandemic when he lost focus or his relationship with the sport. But he was always able to recognize what he did not know, and bring “great ideas” to his own training and that of a new generation of AGUA swimmers, Rodriguez said.
“His ability to stay humble,” Rodriguez added, “and be willing to be thoughtful and mindful about his preparation is something that is rare. And I think it’s something that separates the good from the great athletes.”
Sabovic finished the race with a time of 51.77 seconds, setting a new record for Kosovo.
He thanked Asphalt Green for that success.
“Asphalt Green has an amazing pipeline for swimmers that want to do a lot with the rest of their life, whether it be success in swimming or success in other avenues of life,” he said.
“I’m definitely thankful for a lot of the lessons I learned when I was pretty young alongside David Rodriguez I still use. And some times when I come back to his group and he repeats some of the stuff that I’ve heard before, I hear it with a new perspective and it’s right there to assist me again with whatever challenges I’m facing.”
Sabovic is the second swimmer from Asphalt Green to become an Olympian. Another AGUA alum, Lia Neal, swam for Team USA in 2012 and 2016, taking home bronze and silver medals.
Asphalt Green made waves this year when it announced a public-private partnership with the City Council and the Gray Foundation to provide thousands of New York City second graders with free swim lessons. More than 530 participants are currently enrolled in the program this summer, a spokeswoman for the sports nonprofit told the Daily News.
