Kornacki: Namesnik's Family Finds Life's Sunshine
3/24/2016 12:00:00 AM | Men's Swimming & Diving
Kirsten, Madison and Austin Namesnik on vacation in Italy in 2014
By Steve Kornacki
ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- Eric Namesnik was one of the most beloved student-athletes the University of Michigan has ever had, and letting go of him was a heartbreaker.
Namesnik suffered massive injuries in a car accident that occurred during icy conditions on Jan. 7, 2006. Four days later, as his organs were taken for transplants, the two-time Olympic silver medalist swimmer was removed from life support. He was only 35.
Those were the darkest days for his wife, Kirsten, a former star swimmer herself for the Wolverines. Their two children, Austin and Madison, were toddlers at the time. The future that had been so bright was now completely in question.
But they all found the sunshine of life in the years that followed.
It will do those who loved Eric, known as "Snik," well to learn that his family is thriving back in Kirsten's homeland, The Netherlands, in her small hometown outside of Utrecht.
Austin, now 14, shares his parents' love of swimming and even races in the individual medley that was his father's specialty.
Madison, 12, is a gymnast with a glowing smile like her father had.
"They are doing very well," said Kirsten. "My oldest son is a swimmer, and the scary thing is he's turning into an IMer. But his best stroke is the butterfly, which is my stroke. And it is much harder watching my kid swim in meets than it was when I swam myself. I can tell you that!"
She chuckled at that thought, and our phone conversation brought back so many memories of special times and people.
Kirsten, who taught statistics at U-M, is doing likewise at the University of Utrecht, the largest school in Holland. She sold their house in Saline and moved back home one year after the tragedy.
"It wasn't easy at all to do that, and it was very expensive," said Kirsten. "It's emotional. We built a house in Saline that was too big for us, but we bought it with an eye on the future, to live in until all of our kids moved out to college. We had just finished the basement with extra rooms.
"So, when you decide to leave that behind, that was ..."
Kirsten paused for a few seconds on that thought.
"Now," she continued, "I'm not a person to get attached to a home because it's an object. And you make it your home by bringing your things and your family. But we left that, along with our dog and cat, and I'd lived there for almost 20 years, for over half my life. We were leaving behind friends and our community. I had a great friend who I taught with, Brenda Gunderson, who I was leaving, too. So, it was hard.
"But I still wanted to do it. I needed the support network of my family. I couldn't do it alone."
Jon Urbanchek's world also was shaken by losing Snik.
"He was like the son I never had," said Urbanchek, the long-time Wolverines swimming coach who also was an assistant coach on six U.S. Olympic teams.
Kirsten added, "Jon was like a father to Eric, and Eric really was that son he never had. That is definitely the way to describe their relationship."
Urbanchek said, "Everybody asks, 'Jon, who was your hardest worker and the most dedicated person you ever coached?' I have coached so many dedicated swimmers, but I have to put Eric at the top. He was the one I had the greatest pleasure in coaching."
Namesnik helped lead Michigan to four Big Ten championships, the last of which was in 1993, and he was Urbanchek's assistant for seven seasons (1997-2004), the last three as associate head coach. Namesnik was a volunteer assistant coach at Eastern Michigan University, where he had earned his master's degree in educational leadership, and was coaching the Wolverine Aquatics Swim Club at the time of his tragic car crash.
"His death," said Urbanchek, "it really hit me. I was in San Francisco giving a clinic, and when I found that out I left the clinic that day. I flew home immediately, and by that time he was hooked up through artificial breathing so they could maintain his organs for transplanting.
"You know, he swam with me for eight years (also with the Wolverine Aquatic Swim Club) and then he was the best assistant coach I ever had. If he were alive today, he would be a damned good college coach. He would be getting ready for the NCAAs right now."
Kirsten agreed.
"Eric would be a big league coach right now," she said.
Kirsten said they first met at a swim meet in Rome in 1990, when they were competing for their respective countries. She met him in a group of Wolverines swimmers that included Eric Wunderlich, Brent Lang and Urbanchek because someone in the group had heard she swam for Northern Michigan.
She termed herself a swimming "late-bloomer" and saw an ad in a swimming magazine that connected her to the Upper Peninsula school. Kirsten got a scholarship and enjoyed NMU but said she realized she needed a degree from a larger university in order to pursue postgraduate degrees back in The Netherlands. Her swimming friends at Michigan prompted her to research their school, and "I decided it was the place for me" to transfer.
Eric helped Kirsten obtain registration forms and whatever she needed to make the move to Ann Arbor.
"I got into Michigan on my own because I had good grades," said Kirsten, who also received a swimming scholarship and competed for the Wolverines for two seasons. Her athletic eligibility ran out in 1993, and she proceeded to earn bachelor's degrees in statistics and mathematics the following year.
Kirsten continued as a postgraduate swimmer for three years. She won a bronze medal in the 1994 World University Games in the 200-meter butterfly and qualified for the world championships during that time.
Eric was from western Pennsylvania but graduated from Spanish River High in Boca Raton, Florida. Still, he left the Sunshine State for Michigan. Namesnik won the Big Ten's 400-yard individual medley in 1991 and took a year off after that to train for the Olympics. He graduated with a bachelor's degree in kinesiology with a teaching certificate.
They dated for seven years and were married in 1998, two years after retiring as international competition swimmers.
Eric Namesnik
Kirsten was in Atlanta as a spectator when Eric repeated as the silver medal winner in the 400 IM in the 1996 Olympics.
Namesnik (4:15.25) finished second to Wolverines teammate Tom Dolan (4:14.90) in what Urbanchek described as a "neck-and-neck" race Dolan won by 35-hundredths of one second.
"We were just hoping that Eric would get a medal," said Kirsten. "Now, Eric was probably hoping he would win the gold medal because that is the attitude a competitor has to have. But as outsiders, we were going to be happy if Eric got a medal. We knew Tom Dolan was really, really good and a couple seconds faster than Eric and that there were three or four swimmers good enough to win a medal.
"I would never have thought Eric would come that close to winning. And it was so close. Every time you watch the race, you think he's going to win."
She used to show the video from that event on July 21, 1996 to the children when they were younger.
"We haven't done that in a while," said Kirsten. "At their age now, watching your parents is really not cool, and it's important to focus on their accomplishments, not what we did. But when they were in grade school, we would all watch it. And they would want to watch it again and again. They always said, 'Ohhh! I thought he was going to win this time!'"
Dolan, who also won gold in the 400 IM in the 2000 Sydney Olympics while setting a world record, said nobody pushed him harder than Namesnik.
"One of the reasons I came to Michigan was because Snik was the American record holder in the event that I swam," said Dolan. "So, what better place to go to try to be the best?
"The relationship Snik and I had was very special and unique in that we were different personalities but definitely challenged each other on a daily basis. And that's difficult for two people who are the best in the world training right next to each other. But I credit Snik with a lot of the organization I learned about daily workouts and training."
Tom Malchow, the 1998 Big Ten Swimmer of the Year at Michigan, said at the time of Namesnik's death that he "accomplished more in 35 years than most people could accomplish in three lifetimes."
He talked about Snik in a recent phone conversation.
"I think a lot of people at Michigan at that time probably got their work ethic from Namesnik," said Malchow, who won gold in the 200-meter butterfly in the 2000 Olympics and silver in 1996, the same year Namesnik won his second silver in the 400 IM.
"Namesnik was somebody who didn't take shortcuts. He was the first one to get into the pool for practice and the last one to get out. Snik was a true Michigan man. I wasn't the most talented swimmer, but I developed a good work ethic because of Snik and a few others."
Urbanchek said Namesnik was a classic practical joker and snagged him when calling to inform Urbanchek of his decision between finalists Arizona State and Michigan.
"A couple days before signing day, Eric visited ASU and it was still beautiful in the winter," said Urbanchek. "So, he calls me the day he got back and said, 'Jon, thank you very much for recruiting me, but I've made a decision to attend ASU.' There was quiet on the phone line.
"Then Eric said, 'Jussst kidding!' My heart had stopped."
Urbanchek laughed long and hard at that memory.
Namesnik spent a dozen years swimming and coaching at Canham Natatorium. The pool there was like a home, and the people around and in it became another family. He even started his own family as a result of the special relationship he developed there with the love of his life.
His family, friends, teammates, coaches and those he taught lost more than just a great swimmer and coach when Eric Namesnik died 10 years ago. They lost a man who pushed them harder, made them stronger, made them laugh, and shared their passions for swimming and life.
Snik lit up a room, lit up lives and left a legacy that still glows.
Read more about the Michigan swimming heroes of the 1996 Olympics at MGoBlue.com:
• Tuesday (March 22): Atlanta Holds Olympic Memories for Wolverines
• Wednesday (March 23): Dolan Connects Current Team to Past Successes
