While the world’s best swimmers were competing at the Olympic Games in Rio to open August, one of the Lehigh Valley’s best was making a name for himself even before that. And he resides in the heart of Salisbury.

Salisbury’s Mahlon Reihman, who enjoyed watching many of the Olympic swimming events while on a vacation in the Midwest, set a number of records earlier this summer.

Reihman first broke two of his Parkland Aquatic Club (PAC) individual records last month that qualified him for junior nationals. While he passed on the trip to junior nationals in Minneapolis due to that vacation a couple weeks ago, he was also a part of a number of relay teams that set club records as well.

“I’ve been training for those times, trying to get those cuts,” Reihman said after breaking the 50- and 100-meter freestyle PAC marks. “I missed it by a super-slim margin at states. In my 200 free, I missed the junior nationals qualifying time by .02 seconds. I think that only acted as more motivation. We worked really hard and training long course over the summer.”

He now holds PAC times of 24.23 seconds in the 50 freestyle and 52.13 in the 100 freestyle.

Whether or not he made the trip to junior nationals, the bottom line is that Reihman proved to himself he belongs at that level with his performance in mid-July at his focus meet at Bucknell University. It was the same location where he barely missed out on the qualifying time for junior nationals during states last winter.

“Hopefully I would get much faster by next year, but that cut would let me go to junior nationals next year as well,” Reihman said. “I was definitely bummed out, especially following the meet results and knowing I could have been right up there with some of those guys. But then again the vacation provided a much needed break.”

Reihman also broke a couple marks in a recent ABE championship meet. He broke the league record and pool record in the 100-meter freestyle, while setting the pool record in the 100-meter IM.

Besides a brief two-week break after the state meet last year, Reihman has been going nonstop in the pool gearing up for this fall season. He’s currently in the middle of his other two-week break he gets each year, but by next week he’ll be back in the pool with his goals even higher for the fall season.

Much of his training physically will remain the same from year to year. It’s the mental aspect of the sport that he’s learning to master with each passing season. This fall season with PAC will be no different for the state champion.

“Part of that is not the practices themselves getting harder from year to year,” Reihman said. “It’s you learning to push yourself where it matters, on sets where it matters, and practices when it matters. It’s tough sometimes because sometimes it doesn’t feel like you’re getting better because you swim terribly, you look awful, and you don’t feel good. But then you hit your tape and you drop a ton of time.”

It’s all about trusting the process over the course of a season. He’s continued to put his trust in his coaches and believe in his training, and that has propelled him the best swimming of his life.

“The goal is to use what you got in your long course training and all your lifting and training the rest of the year to gear yourself to where you were,” Reihman said. “And the second part is get yourself better than you were the year before.”

And with the Olympics going, Reihman has gained a newfound respective for the top swimmers in the world. It’s been an inspiration for him to push himself even further as he prepares for his final high school season.

“I’ve probably watched the Olympics for as long as I can remember,” Reihman said. “But I’ve only really started appreciating them and focusing on swimming probably only this Olympics because I can gauge my times versus these big guys, and realize how incredibly impressive these guys are.

“Watching these Olympic Games, especially the swimming part, totally motivates me. I’ve been really excited to get back in the water and start training again this next season to get faster.”