OMAHA — I’ve been the Forrest Gump of sportswriters, a witness to all kinds of history. I was there for the Mighty Ducks’ first N.H.L. game and Pete Sampras’s last major victory; for the Giants’ last-minute win over the Patriots in Super Bowl XLII and the Cubs’ playoff loss to the Marlins in the infamous Bartman game.

Yet no sporting event has meant more to me than the United States Olympic swimming trials.

The first one I attended changed my life. I was 13, a member of a Northern California swimming club who dreamed of competing in the Olympics. But first, I had to get through middle school.

Near the end of eighth grade, my English teacher assigned a project: create a magazine. Mine was called Splash, to be anchored by a Q. and A. with a swimmer. But which one?

To my father, a salesman with a gift for persuasion, the answer was obvious: Mike Bruner.

Bruner, the best swimmer on my team, was also one of the top performers in the world. He was 19, a mechanical engineering major at Stanford who was favored to make the 1976 United States squad in multiple events. He had a shaved head and might as well have had winged feet given his exalted status on my team.