Mark Warkentin

Mark Warkentin is proof you can go home again.

After swimming all over the world, Warkentin is back where he started in competitive swimming, the Santa Barbara Swim Club. The 2008 U.S. Olympian, four-time AllAmerican at USC and four-time CIF-Southern Section champion at San Marcos High, is now developing youth swimmers as coach of the club.

Warkentin was a phenom at San Marcos High from 1994-98. He never lost an individual event in his four years swimming for the Royals in dual meets and league finals. He holds school records in five events and is the league record holder in the 500 freestyle.

He continued his success in college at USC and at the international level. He placed eighth in the 400 free at the 1996 Olympic Trials, won a gold medal in the 400 free at the 1998 Goodwill Games and took home five golds (200, 400 and 800 freestyle, 4×200 free relay and open water events) from the 1999 World University Games.

He turned his focus to open water swimming and became one of best in the world. He won the 25k race at the USA Swimming National championships and took bronze medals in the 5k and 10k races in 2006. That same year, he captured the 10k at the World Cup in Belem, Brazil, where in the swift current of the Amazon River, he was timed in a blazing 1 hour, 26 minutes.

“The 2006 race was the last World Cup race ever held in the Amazon,” he said.

In 2007, Warkentin placed fourth in the 25k at the World Championships in Melbourne, Australia, repeated as the 25k national champion and again won bronze in the 5k and 10k and won the 10k at the U.S. Olympic Trials.

In 2009, he earned a silver in the 25k and took seventh in the 10k at the World Championships in Seville, Spain, to earn a spot in the field at 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, China.

He dug deep to qualify for the Olympics. “Only the top 10 finishers from this race would qualify, and with 3,000 meters left I was in a tightly bunched group of (approximately) eight athletes vying for the last four spots,” Warkentin said. “The physical nature of that 3,000 meters resulted in two red card ejections from the race. After 90 minutes of fastpaced swimming, the final 30-minute sprint was the longest sustained period of pain I’ve ever endured.”

He finished eighth in the first open-water competition in Olympic history.

In 2010, he competed in the Faros Marathon Swim in Croatia and took first place.