The Grind, presented by Bank of Clarendon: Sumter High's Benenhaley takes Gamecocks to state one last time
If you've ever been to Sumter Aquatics Center during a Sumter High swim meet or practice, you've almost certainly noticed Anthony Benenhaley.
The senior has been a staple of the Gamecock program since he was in middle school. He went to state as an eighth-grader and has been back every year since. Outside of the pool, he's magnetic. He walks with a confidence built by hours spent in the pool, and he's quick to crack a joke and flash a smile.
Anthony is the main reason he isn't going to the state meet next week by himself, as he has for the last three years. He helped guide two relay teams to qualify for the final race of the year. The Gamecocks are going as a team because he brings the best out of his teammates.
"Anthony is so infectious. He makes people want to be better," Sumter High head coach Cathy Kirkhart said. "My son (Gabriel) only swims high school. He's always done other sports, and he's naturally good at swimming, but it's never been his thing. But Anthony makes things fun and infectious and wants you to be there for everyone else, so he's worked hard enough to be a part of that relay team."
AFRAID TO DIVE IN
Anthony is often the most confident swimmer in the pool, but that wasn't always the case. When he was first learning the sport, he wanted nothing to do with the pool.
"It wasn't no, 'Oh, he's a natural.' I was terrified. I was petrified of the water in the beginning," Anthony said of starting around 8 years old. "My dad got real mad at me because I never wanted to get in; I couldn't put my face in the water."
Anthony's first crack at swimming didn't last long. His parents, Chris and Christina, quickly pulled the plug with the intention of trying again later.
"We were like, 'OK, we don't have the patience for this. This is not his sport. We'll try again later, maybe,'" Christina recalled. "Once we tried again that next year, he got in the water, and he was a fish. Once it stuck and he knew he was good, it was game over."
As soon as swimming clicked, Anthony was all in. As he reached middle school, he swam for the high school team at Sumter High. He'd previously spent hours competing at the YMCA and dominated the pool. It was a different story when he got to Sumter High.
"The kids that were on the team at the time nicknamed him fairly quickly when he came out to practice with the high school. They nicknamed him 'Try-hard.' Which, in fairness, was probably an accurate nickname," Cathy said. "He was 12 years old, had been swimming the Y swim program and on the Y swim team, he was it. At 12, he was the swimmer to look up to. He rolled into a high school program that had been swimming higher competitive meets than he'd ever seen. He just wanted to impress everyone. He wanted to show everyone he was there to work.
"He didn't come in bragging that he was good; he came in wanting to show everybody he was good. It's just what makes everyone fall in love with Anthony; it's not what's coming out of his mouth, it's his actions. He always puts his actions first. I just remember a really excited kid coming out, wanting to do the best he could do. He wasn't discouraged that he wasn't the best anymore. He was going to work until he was just as good as they are. He's always had that mentality."
GROWING IN THE POOL
Around the same time, he started swimming club in Columbia with Palmetto Aquatics, which has since been renamed Gamecock Aquatics. While it wasn't ideal, it became necessary when Anthony's coach at the Y, Igor Iovanovich, was promoted within the organization and moved to Florida.
"Nobody wants to drive back and forth from Columbia every day," Christina said with a hearty chuckle.
Luckily, the Benenhaleys had some help. Cathy's daughter Hayden is four years older than Anthony and helped him find the right club program in Columbia. Once she could drive, the pair made the hour-long drive over to Columbia, practiced for a few hours and drove the hour back home. That daily ritual quickly built a bond between the duo.
"Hayden was kind of like my mentor when I was just coming in seventh, eighth grade," Anthony said. "She believed in me from the jump. I'm really close with Hayden. She drove me every single day to all the Palmetto practices. She's like my older sister, and I love her to death, and she definitely has a huge part in my success in swimming."
Hayden was integral to Anthony's development. As Sumter High's top swimmer, she provided a goal to shoot for. When Anthony was in the eighth grade, he qualified for state for the first time, and Hayden was right by his side.
"If I didn't have Hayden with me, I would have been a hot mess at state," he admits. "I would have been walking in the wrong locker rooms. She had been to state countless times prior, and she told me the ropes.
"She was just like that protective older sister. If I ever had a problem or a question I'd go to Hayden. If I was ever getting picked on or didn't like something, I always go to Hayden and let her know, and she'd take care of it."
Cathy also loved seeing the way her daughter drove the young standout.
"They ended up being the perfect pair together," she said. "We still joke about it because he still hasn't gotten as fast as her backstroke is, and his goal is always to beat Hayden in that 100 back. It was good because it showed him that you can be successful without being good with everything. He eventually got faster than her in the other events, but it kept him humble knowing there's a girl out there that can beat him in an event."
ONE-MAN BAND
After Hayden graduated, Anthony's annual trips to state became solo missions. While he knew he wasn't the only swimmer going to state without a team, it wasn't quite as fun without a unit to share the experience with.
"Every other team that goes to state for swimming, whether it be high school or club, I feel like the more swimmers you have, no matter how good or bad they are, the energy that they carry with them (is important)," he said. "That's why usually your teams will perform at their best level when they're at home because they've got all the parents that they know, all the family, the friends and the vibe. It's their territory, their environment."
That was supposed to change last year, when Jordan Hewett also earned a spot in the state meet. But Jordan hurt his hand right before the meet and was unable to swim, so Anthony was headed to Columbia alone once again.
This year is different. Anthony and Jordan both qualified again, but it won't just be a Gamecock duo at the Carolina Natatorium on Oct. 19. The Gamecocks will have two relay teams, the 200 medley and the 200 freestyle, which both include Jack Easton and Gabriel Kirkhart. Anthony is incredibly excited to have that team atmosphere at state.
"That was one of his goals going into his senior year," Christina said. "He was like, 'I want to have a relay team.' He went several years by himself, and of course, now he's familiar with Blatt (Pool), where state takes place. He gets to see a lot of his friends from Gamecock Aquatics and a lot of the high-schoolers that he swam with over the years. So, he still had people there, but they're still not your team. He was on a mission to have a relay team go to state his senior year."
COMPETITIVE EDGE
One reason Anthony has thrived in the pool is his need to compete.
"Just progressing and that hunger and drive for wanting to be better and swimming faster than everybody else," Anthony said of what drives him. "We could have a who can throw a pine cone the farthest competition, and I'm gonna want to win. I'm really competitive, and I love water."
Some of that comes from being the youngest of the Benenhaleys.
"He's the youngest of four boys, so there you go," Christina joked.
"If nothing else, he was competing for attention," Chris added. "He gets it honestly. I'm very competitive myself. My wife can be also. So, I think it was just kind of ingrained in him to be competitive from the start."
Going to Columbia every day only delivered more and more competition. He wanted to do whatever he could to get better.
"It's just hammering down the techniques and, at the end of the day, I feel like with every great thing a human does, it's just self-discipline and really honing in and like harnessing that energy and focus and just being on a mission," he said.
Through all that crazy competitive energy, there is still a much softer side to Anthony.
"To many people, it may not be obvious at first because Anthony does not lack any self-confidence. A matter of fact, we've all tried to teach him that humility is important," Chris said. "But once you get to know him and you spend a little bit of time with him, you realize very quickly how big of a heart he actually has, how caring he is, how genuine he is. He really loves those around him, likes to lift people up.
"Once you get past the boy in him that likes to be rambunctious and loud, he's really kind-hearted and he just loves people, he truly does. He really cares. It doesn't take long to figure out."
ONE LAST RIDE
The trip to state next week will likely be Anthony's last competitive meet in the pool, though he hasn't entirely ruled out a return to club once he's done wrestling at Sumter High this winter.
Anthony had his chances to swim in college but ultimately decided that the grind of swimming year-round was too taxing to pursue at the next level.
"I've definitely gotten burnt out a few times swimming year-round. It's a hard thing, it's very difficult to love something that much and to be that committed to it. You've gotta take a step back sometimes and really just understand, 'OK, why do I love this? Why did I start this in the beginning? Who am I doing this for really?'" Anthony said. "Because I feel like a lot of people wanna believe that this is for my mom, this is for my dad, my grandparents, my brother, my sister, and I really feel like everyone should be doing whatever they're doing for themselves. That's the only thing that's going to keep them going and wanting to do it. And the second someone realizes, 'Oh, I'm doing this for my parents or for my brothers or for my grandparents,' they should either take a step back or move on completely because you're not doing it for the right reasons, in my opinion. I feel like everything you do, every step you take, needs to be for your own good and for your own personal development."
Anthony had a lot of conversations with his older friends in the sport, including Hayden, to get an idea of what it takes to compete in college. Hayden competes at Delta State and was able to express the rigors of swimming at the next level.
"People expected it out of him, and he was looking towards what else he wanted to do," Cathy said. "Swimming is a lot. There are a lot of athletics that take a lot of time, but they're not every season, they're not every day. It's not a joke when you see memes about swimmers that have friends asking where they are, why they aren't answering texts and phone calls, and it's always, 'I'm in the pool.' To maintain that level, you have to decide that it's exactly where you want to be. He was able to bounce that off her more to understand, at the collegiate level, what expectations are made and if that's the direction he wanted to go."
Anthony will never stop swimming, but he decided he needed to see what else is out there.
"I feel like I've been around swimming for a long time and I know a lot about the sport, and I don't want to ever totally get away from the sport, not at all. I'm always going to be around water in some shape or form, maybe even coaching possibly someday in the future," he said. "I felt like, talking about recruitment and all of these offers from colleges and scholarships, it's nice to get the attention, but I feel like there's more for me to explore. I'm gonna get my USC Sumter associate degree for free and then transfer to USC Columbia and just see what God has in store for me."
Before that moment comes, Anthony will suit up for Sumter High one last time. He'll swim his best event, the 100 breaststroke, where he's dominated all season long with times just over a minute. He'll also swim the butterfly, the event where Cathy has seen the most growth out of him this year.
"He's always been able to swim it well, but he never had the power behind it he has this year," she said. "Taking this year where he's not driving back and forth to Columbia, he's gotten back into more weightlifting, he started wrestling last year. That all creates a different strength aspect. He's gotten stronger and more flexible with wrestling, and that carries into the pool."
And, of course, he'll swim those two relays. More than anything, he wants to show up for his teammates, just as they showed up for him all season long.
"To be a good leader for my team, to place top 10 in one, hopefully two relays. And I'd say to either stay in the top 10 in my individual events or try to crack top five in both of them," Anthony said of his goals at state. "And try to stay as humble as I possibly can. When I was young, I thought I was that guy or 'him' as they say. I mean, nobody could tell me anything. And over the years, I've had tons of slices of humble pie, and they don't taste that good. And now I understand that humility is No. 1 24/7. No matter how many compliments you may get or how good you really may be, being humble is always the best route to go.
"And I have my parents to thank for that, Jesus, of course, coach Cathy, my family. I credit the success that I've had to I'm blessed to be chosen by God and carry out this mission for him. I'm just blessed."
Cathy would love to see her senior star get a shot at standing on the podium after his final high school race, but more than anything, she wants him to enjoy the ride.
"I want him to have that last fun competitive moment with his group of boys that he's raised up," she said. "I've always told him this isn't about somebody else's goals, it's about doing something you enjoy. It's fun to go fast, and you're good at it, so don't stress over it, don't set up this expectation that you're going to disappoint somebody if you don't reach a particular goal.
"Your goal is to go out there and do your best and have fun doing it. You have to have the mindset that this is not the end all, this is just another step in enjoying what you've always been good at. So many people get so focused on the end result and not the trip there that they miss the point."