August 22, 2026

Who’s in that Lane for August of 2026?! Andrew MacNaughton and Diane Smith, that’s who!

Just a reminder that these Who’s In That Lane! pieces celebrate our club and our teammates, and help us to get to better know our lanemates and the people in those lanes over there! I know we all enjoy being a part of CVMM, and it’s even better when more of us really know each other!  

These Who’s In That Lane posts celebrate our CVMM members, and in WITL #10, we are celebrating Andrew and Diane because they were the Swimmers of the Month earlier this summer. (Diane’s the one on the left).

Let’s start with Diane, shall we? We have several teachers and retired teachers in CVMM. Diane was a teacher, counselor, and assistant principal in LAUSD for 30 years before retiring. After she retired, she loved “having an every day is Saturday life.” She moved to Hawaii and did the outrigger canoe thing for 10 years, even winning a race paddling from Molokai to Oahu. Impressive!

Diane has been with CVMM since 2010, and she loves the fitness, the laughter, and the competition. She looks forward to being part of every practice, and you can usually find her at the MWF at noon workout. As someone who swam at 5:30 and 6:00 AM for years when I worked as a proud fellow public school educator, I agree with Diane and appreciate what a luxury that sunny noon workout is. In terms of her times, she’s not about swimming her 100s on a certain interval. She is just there to swim and do the best she can. She does like it with Coach Nancy has us swim fast 25s and 50s. I like that – never trust a person who likes distance swimming. Diane has swam in a few meets and of course has medals to show for it. In the picture below, she has more medals than Katie Ledecky!  She loves the meets, and why wouldn’t she!

There a few people I meet who make me feel better just by being around them. Diane is one of those people. I bet she was a phenomenal teacher and counselor. And I know she’s a fantastic person to have in our CVMM family.

Let’s move on to Andrew MacNaughton! Andrew is known as a fun loving swimmer who wears the swim cap with lots of multi-colored suction cups, like an alien hairnet, in the pool. He pulls it off and it makes all of us just a little happier to be there. His favorite swim set is the easy 50. Classic. But in reality, he doesn’t care what the workout is. He loves doing whatever Coach Nancy calls, and is grateful just to be going back and forth with his teammates. He never swam competitively in high school or college, and yet, he is flat out fast and is quite comfortable on the faster side of the pool. He enjoys swim meets and has done all of the events there. And his favorite thing about CVMM – no surprise – it’s the people. 

Andrew is kind of famous in our club for his triathlon efforts. CVMM has a whole lot of triathletes trying to become better swimmers, even though being a great swimmer helps you a lot less than being a great biker or runner. Back in 1987, 1990 AND in 1993, he won the Wildflower Triathlon, setting a course record in 1990 that stood for years! Wow!  (I did the Wildflower twice in the late 80s, but you won’t find my name on any of the stairs.) Again, wow!

Last Andrew story – While he may be proud of the triathlon accomplishments, he does not want to talk about them. The story he did share may be more illuminating. He was riding on a train with some friends in Thailand. It was a comfortable train and he had a ticket and a seat and everything. Without telling his friends, he disembarked from the train from one of the stops without his luggage. The train started to take off, and he gave it a 30 second or so head start. Then he started running. You see, he’d always wanted to catch and then jump on a moving train. As he got close, the train started gaining speed, and he didn’t think he was going to make it. Putting in one final effort, he made the leap and made the train. He didn’t even tell his companions about it until 18 years later! Andrew does things because he wants to do them, and doesn’t give a hoot about impressing anyone else. I asked him what Plan B was, in case he didn’t make it. He smiled, shrugged, and said, “I’m sure it would have worked out.” 

I love it.

When I started looking at this piece – I knew Andrew – he’s a fun loving guy in the pool, and I knew Diane as an incredibly friendly presence in the pool, but I didn’t know they knew each other. They swim many lanes apart, but here’s the thing about CVMM swimming. CVMM friendships are not based on having common swimming backgrounds or ability. When I asked them about their friendship, Andrew said that he loves Diane’s happy playful and sarcastic nature, while Diane loves Andrew being a fun person to be around, she loves his crazy swim caps, and appreciates the kind things that Andrew has done for her.

Cheers to Diane and Andrew, and I know we all look forward to seeing them in the water soon.

To see previous Who’s In That Lane pieces, please click here.

• #1 – Becky Cleavenger, Don Smith, Shelly Marshall, and Matt Biondi (Jan, ‘24)
• #2 – Melanie Perry and Daniel Hommes (Feb, ‘24)
• #3 – CVMM 9th Annual Matt Biondi Short Course Yards Masters Meet (March 17th, 2024)
• #4 – Krishanne (Krish) Nishi, (May, ‘24)
• #5 – Bill Marshall and Kim Kitchen (Aug, ‘24)
• #6 – Ali English and Clark Trainor (Oct, ‘24)
• #7 – Johnny Potenza and JP Llanos (Sept, ‘25)
• #8 – Daniel Beylkin (May, ‘26)
• #9 – Mike Matthews (June, ‘26) (Written by Keith Robinson)

• Submitted by Mike Matthews, proud CVMM swimmer since 2021.