As a freshman moving to Charleston from Iowa City, Iowa, Harris Thompson has definitely made a splash here at Eastern.

He only started swimming when he was in junior high so his career is still very young. Once he started to dedicate himself more to the sport in high school, he started to flourish in it and eventually turn that into a college career on the Eastern men’s swimming team.

Thompson seems to be very happy with his decision to come to Eastern.

“I chose Eastern because when I visited the campus and the team, I got this family-type atmosphere that I didn’t really get when visiting other campuses,” Thompson said.

Choosing Eastern has definitely paid off for the 18-year-old freshman from Iowa City so far. Thompson broke the school record in the 1,650-yard freestyle on Nov. 22. Not only was this a school record, but it was also a House of Champions Meet record.

Thompson clocked in with at 15:59.23, cracking the 16-minute mark by 77 hundredths of a second. Not even Thompson expected he would do so well.

“I was just shocked I got under 16 minutes,” he said. “I was pretty pumped about that.”

As he finished the race Thompson was certain that he had come away victorious, but did not expect to hear the next announcement.

“I looked up and I knew I won the race so I was pretty excited about that,” Thompson said. “They announced that I had just broke the meet record, but I had no idea I broke the school record too until later. I was still just excited that I won the race.”

Senior swimmer Colin McGill provided the motivation for Thompson prior to the meet.

“He really gets me and everyone else pumped before meets,” Thompson said of McGill’s pre-meet speeches.

Motivated and prepared prior the House of Champions Meet, Thompson still did not see a record-breaking performance coming.

Greg Freebeck previously held the record, which was set in 1984. Freebeck swam the 1,650-freestyle with a time of 16:06.80.

Thompson beat that time by more than seven seconds.

Not only did Thompson break the school record in the 1,650-yard freestyle, he also has the eighth-best time in school history in the 500-yard freestyle and also the third-best school time in the 1,000-yard freestyle.

Thompson thought he would come to Eastern expecting to contribute to the team as a freshman, but putting his name in the record book was not on his radar.

“I thought I could come here and help out right away,” he said. “But I never thought I would break a record this early into my college career.”

The way Thompson is swimming now, none of those records are safe.

Thompson still has three more years to find out what is in store for him.

Dan Hildebrandt can be reached at 581-2812 or djhildebrandt@eiu.edu.