OLYMPIC DREAMS

“Sitting on the edge of superstardom” is how U.S. Swimming touts Kaitlin Sandeno. Sitting? Odd choice of word. She has no time to sit.

Not long after the sun set last Friday, Sandeno jumped out of the pool, showered, dried off and changed clothes in her typical hurry. To where was one of America’s most promising swimmers rushing? To film an interview with ESPN? To sign a contract to endorse a swimsuit?

Well, no. You know those ridiculously oversized foam fingers, the ones fans across America wave to proclaim their team is No. 1? Kaitlin Sandeno, 16, junior class president at El Toro High, had to pass them out at a basketball game Friday night.

For Sandeno and Aaron Peirsol, 16, a sophomore at Newport Harbor High, the road to the Olympic Games goes through math class. High school is hard enough without worrying about qualifying for, oh, the biggest sporting event in the world, but Sandeno and Peirsol seem to manage just fine.

“People at school remind me of reality and social life,” Peirsol said. “They keep me from thinking about swimming all the time. That’s probably why I still love the sport so much.”

Peirsol, the youngest American to break two minutes in the 200-meter backstroke, ranks ninth in the world in that event. Sandeno, who ranks among the world’s top seven in the 400- and 800-meter freestyle and 400-meter individual medley, plans to swim all those events--and the 200-meter butterfly--at the U.S. Olympic trials in August.

The top two swimmers in each event qualify for the Olympic Games in Sydney. The rest must wait four years to try again. And, while Sandeno and Peirsol write book reports, many of their rivals train full-time, having already graduated from high school and college.

“In some regards, I think it’s advantageous [for the high school students],” said Dave Salo, Peirsol’s coach at Irvine Novaquatics. “He can’t sit there and mull over swimming all day long. I’ve got 12-15 post-grads, and they go home after practice and think about practice until the next workout. He’s got the distractions of high school--academics, friends who aren’t swimmers.”

Of course, without first period looming, the post-grads can wait until after the sun rises to start their morning workout. Peirsol hits the water at 5:30 a.m. for the first of two daily workouts, returns to the pool after classes and arrives home at 7 p.m. for his cycle of “homework, eat, sleep, wake up again.” On Tuesday and Thursday, with no morning workouts, “that’s what I call sleeping in--until about 6:30,” he said.

Despite a similar schedule, Sandeno refuses to allow swimming to prevent her from enjoying her high school years. She has served as class president each year. She dressed up as Barbie for Halloween, with a pink top, cheerleader skirt and “big cheesy jewelry.” She is helping to plan the junior-senior prom. She loved her weekend at student government camp--”It sounds so dorky, but it’s the most fun thing,” she said.

Vic Riggs, one of Sandeno’s coaches with the Nellie Gail/Saddleback Valley Gators, insists the school involvement does not detract from her swimming.

“She’s missed maybe one or two practices,” Riggs said. “And, from the social aspect, it’s not a negative. She’s not out until 1 or 2 in the morning. You can’t live, breathe and die your sport or you’ll end up in trouble.”

Said El Toro volleyball player Katherine Varin: “I can’t pull off my schedule as it is. I can’t believe her. She’s got so much on her hands. She seems to manage it all, and she can still hang out with us and be a good friend.”

Come September, perhaps, the friends of Sandeno and Peirsol can gather around a television set and root for a hero of their own wearing red, white and blue.

“I can only imagine what representing your nation is like at the Olympics,” Peirsol said. “Australia is a really cool place. I really want to go. I know how much fun it would be.”

No pressure, mate. This is not a last, desperate chance at the Olympics from an adult who postponed the rest of his or her life four years after failing to qualify for the Atlanta Games.

“Four years ago? I was 12,” Sandeno said. “I was just watching the Olympics because of Amanda [Beard, the gold-medal swimmer from Irvine], because I thought she was so sweet. But I wasn’t winning nationals or anything.”

No, this is a first chance for two swimmers who burst into international prominence within the past two years. When the Athens Games arrive in 2004, with many of the Sydney swimmers retired, Sandeno and Peirsol will be college students.

“I can only get stronger and faster,” Peirsol said. “This year isn’t as important as a lot of other people’s years are. With me being so young, I have so many years ahead of me.

“I don’t have to go to this one. It’s a goal. But if I don’t make it, it’s not the end of the world.”

Said Sandeno: “It’s just the experience of being in the Olympic trials. Who goes there that doesn’t want to make the team? But that would be the icing on the cake.”

Many a high school student trembles at the thought of standing before a class and discussing Shakespeare or World War II. If Sandeno and Peirsol make it to Sydney, they will have to stand before the television cameras of the world and discuss families, prom dates, the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat.

For Sandeno, who aspires to follow swimmer Summer Sanders from the medal stand to the broadcast booth, there could be no finer experience. At 16, Sandeno already knows the scouting report on her as a broadcaster.

“I say ‘um’ and ‘like’ too much,” she said. “My brother-in-law tells me I need to start talking correctly.”

Peirsol should be a natural too. Before a recent meet in San Diego, he handled a last-minute request for a speech with poise that amazed his coach.

“It was totally spur of the moment,” Peirsol said. “I had nothing planned to say, so I pretty much ad-libbed the whole thing. It was interesting to get up in front of a camera like that.

“I definitely enjoy it. I have no problem being interviewed. It’s fun to be noticed every once in a while.”

At school, he already is. In high school, where youths desperately yearn for an identity, any identity, Peirsol says just about every conversation starts with, “Hey, how’s swimming going?”

And Sandeno?

“I have freshmen come up to me at school,” she said, “and say, ‘You’re that swimmer chick, aren’t you?’ ”