From the other side of the Canham Natatorium pool deck, the numbers are so small you almost have to squint to see them.

Walking toward the wall of the natatorium's diving well, the red LED lights become less blurred.

509 days. 10 hours. 52 minutes. 25 seconds. Beijing 2008.

Past and potential Olympians swim back and forth in the pool. Stroke for stroke, the seconds tick away as the athletes race to get better. The Michigan swimmers still have a full collegiate season before the 2008 Olympic Trials (June 29, 2008) and the Aug. 8-24 Beijing Olympics - but their serious Olympic training begins in one month.

Just 509 days from now, both Michigan collegiate and club swimmers are expecting to make the U.S. Olympic Team roster.

"It's not the work you do the summer of - it's the work you do the summer before, so we're really focusing on getting a lot of training done this summer," junior Alex Vanderkaay said. "It's not too early to talk about it. I think everybody kind of keeps quiet, but I know everybody's thinking about it."

This summer, Olympic hopefuls on the Michigan team will stay in Ann Arbor to train with Club Wolverine. They will swim with past gold medalists like two-time Olympian Klete Keller, current Michigan student Michael Phelps and Michigan alum Peter Vanderkaay.

Since the Michigan swimmers won't have time to complete a full training cycle between the end of the college season in March and the Olympic Trials in June, the summer training will provide an opportunity to improve without regular-season, Big Ten and NCAA commitments. In addition to physical training, Michigan coach Bob Bowman hopes to help his swimmers prepare for the intangible pressures of competing for swimming's highest prize.

"The real challenges are being able to swim a meet that's so pressurized like the Olympic Trials and do well, and then refocus to do well at the Olympic Games four weeks later," Bowman said. "I think, physically, it's not so much of an issue, but it's very hard to emotionally peak twice in one summer."

Keller said that during the "down cycle" of Olympic training, which lasts for about two years after the previous Games, athletes retire and physical training is less strenuous. Within two years of the next Olympics, though, swimmers stage comebacks and younger athletes start as contenders.

"We're almost to the year before, when it starts getting exciting and you should expect to perform really fast year-round in swim meets," Keller said. "For me, the year after the Olympics, I don't really care how fast I swim at a swim meet. But the year before the Olympics, there's a lot more pressure to perform well at any meet you go to. With 514 (sic) days out, we're starting to get to a really serious point now."

The summer before his freshman year at Michigan, Alex Vanderkaay finished 19th in the 200-yard butterfly at the 2004 Olympic Trials. After three previous attempts to swim an Olympic Trials qualifying time, he made the cut about two weeks before the meet.

Alex Vanderkaay and freshman Scott Spann both said they hadn't expected to swim in Athens but participated in the Trials so that they would be prepared to be serious contenders for the 2008 Olympic team. Spann, a sophomore in high school at the time, described his first Trials experience as "nerve-wrecking."

"It was horrible for me, at least," said Spann, who swam one event at the 2004 meet. "I was in the first heat, which was the slowest. . There was about 5,000 or 6,000 people watching that morning. I got so nervous because that was the most number of people I've seen at a swim meet. I didn't swim very well."

Looking back, even Keller (who left Southern Cal in 2002 to turn professional) didn't think he would make the Olympic team before the 2000 Trials. But after sealing a spot on his first Olympic team, he swam to two medals in Sydney.

Keller said one of the possible pressures for current Michigan swimmers vying to be first-time Olympians could be competing against world-record holders and gold medalists.

"I know when I was their age, I was kind of intimidated by that," he said. "There were some people in my events that have been historically really fast, and I didn't think that they could ever be beat or that I could ever beat them.

"Before I went to my first Olympics, I just had a major breakthrough. . The challenge is to just not get upset if it seems like you're way behind the upper competition, because you never know what will happen."

Next summer, Spann will have to place in the top two in the breaststroke to make the Olympic team. The freshman will compete against collegiate and professional swimmers, including current world-record holder Brendan Hansen, for the chance to swim in Beijing.

Alex Vanderkaay said his best chance to make the 2008 team would come in the 200-yard butterfly.