The University of Idaho swimming and diving team heads east this weekend for meets with the Air Force Academy (Friday) and Denver University (Saturday).

It’s a trip that presents challenges the Vandals have not faced yet this season – travel and meets on back-to-back days.

“Our conference meet is three and one half days so this is something that we train for and embrace,” coach Mark Sowa said. “But, we continue to preach focusing on one race at a time, one meet at a time and to not get too far ahead of ourselves.

“This is good preparation for the challenges that we will see later in the season but, ultimately, we focus on Air Force first then move on to the challenge of Denver.”

Denver, Sowa says, should be a contender for the Western Athletic Conference title, while Air Force has been a strong Mountain West Conference team. In addition to their strength as teams, both have the home-pool advantage of living and training at “mile high.”

“Racing at 5,000 feet against two very good teams doesn’t tickle,” Sowa said. “However, we will be ready for that and will not make excuses.”

The Vandals are coming off a home victory over Seattle University and are 1-1 on the season. Sowa has been impressed with his young squad that lists just three seniors.

“We have seen tremendous improvement from our entire team,” he said. “We have seen the freshmen mature quickly but they are still freshmen with a lot to learn. I have said many times how impressed I am with how this group enjoys competition. I have enjoyed seeing more of that in training over the last two weeks.”