Welcome!

My name is Jessica Steffens and on June 29, 2008 at 7:50 am I became an Olympian. I play Water Polo with the most incredible women in the sport and now we are preparing for the Olympics in Beijing, China to begin on 08-08-08 and guess what my cap number is.....8! I have to say it has been a little strange being #8 this year, I have never actually had an even number (3, 17 have been my go-to guys) but I've come to wear it proudly especially now that I know I'm on the team.

Anyway, this past year I moved down to Seal Beach CA to train at the Los Alamitos Joint Forces Base where Chavez greets us at the gate almost every morning. Fortunately, I was able to move in with my Stanford teammate, Alison Gregorka, an Ann Arbor MI native and fellow defender on the team. The team is composed of mostly SoCalers but we have 2 Michiganians/Michiganders, 1 Oregonian and Heather Petri and I representing the East Bay.

I wanted to start this blog so that everyone who has been so supportive and interested in all that we've been up to can FINALLY follow us along. The Olympics are going to be an incredible event and I want to be able to share it with you all! So I will do my best to keep the blog updated without violating the rules about Olympic information that I have not read yet....I don't want to get into trouble with NBC!