Kris Malinin

The journey all started around the age of six when Kris Malinin first joined a summer swim team. His parents signed him and his brother up to help them learn how to swim and as an effort to get them to try new sports. Little did Malinin know that he would end up swimming for the New York University swim team.

Kris Malinin graduated in 2017. He was a big part of the Fossil Ridge swim team throughout his four years at Fossil and was part of the team winning the state championship meet for the first time in history his sophomore year. As part of the team, Malinin became close to Coach Morehouse.  Morehouse mentioned, “Kris is a rare high school swimmer. Swimming is not the only thing he does. He has a whole other area of his life that he’s talented in and can be a talented athlete too. He did very well and placed very high for a school swimmer athlete and not a club swimmer.” During the state championship, he was part of swimming the 100-free, 50-free, and the 200-free relay and was in the finals for the 50-free and the 200-free relay. He said, “There is no better feeling than being a part of such an amazing team and beating out a long-time rival like Regis for the first time. I’m not sure I’ve ever been as excited in my life as I was at that moment.”

Today, Malinin is studying music production at NYU’s Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music and says he is loving every minute of it. He is still on the NYU swim team, although he had to sit this season out due to a pretty serious back injury he sustained while lifting last year. Malinin is doing a lot better now, though, and hoping to get back in the pool next season after a semester abroad in Berlin.

Swimming has had a huge impact on Malinin’s academics and on his personal work ethic and time management. He said he bombed the first semester of his freshman year at Fossil. He had just moved to Fort Collins from Boulder and had a tough time seeing the benefit of doing homework every night. Then, the swim season began and everyone on the team put a lot of their time and effort into making sure everyone has good academics. Having that extra encouragement (and pressure) behind Malinin at all times really made him turn things in an entirely different direction. Since then, Malinin is much better at managing his time and he does not think he ha missed a single homework assignment since that freshman year. During Milinin’s experience at Fossil with the swim team, Morehouse watched him throughout all four years. He talked a lot about how Milinin was a hard worker, a great athlete, and never gave up, trying to always work his hardest. Milinin has been greatly missed being a part of the Fossil swim team.

After being in college for a few years, Malinin has learned a lot. When talking with him, he said, “College athletics are definitely a big step up from high school sports, but don’t let that discourage you. Obviously, you have to put the work in, but if your heart is truly in it, all you have to do is keep that goal of playing at the next level in mind and the rest will follow surprisingly easily.”