CANYONS CLUB WILL SWIM WITH BEST.

Byline: Chris Cocoles Staff Writer

VALENCIA - This is the week that figures to test many of the Canyons Aquatic Club swimmers.

A meet as prestigious as the Janet Evans Invitational, which runs from Thursday through Sunday at USC, tends to tell coaches a lot about one's mettle.

Roughly 60 percent of the participants are already at the college level. Many of the Canyons swimmers are still in high school. Among the more recent stars at the event: Olympic champions like Lenny Krayzelburg, Canyons alum Anthony Ervin, Jenny Thompson, Dara Torres and, of course, Evans, who still holds the meet record in the 800 freestyle.

``It's fun for them because they're swimming against people they read about in the newspaper,'' coach Bruce Patmos said. ``They may be in the same pool with them, or even in the same lane warming up. And they get to swim against people they normally don't swim against.''

Ervin, who also attended Hart High, didn't perform as well as Patmos expected when the eventual 2000 Sydney Olympics gold medalist was in his junior and senior years.

``If they allow it to happen, there's pressure,'' Patmos said.

Then there's rising star John Criste, who at 14 won't begin his freshman year at Saugus High until the fall. But he's one Canyons swimmer Patmos doesn't anticipate any cases of stage fright from.

``You take somebody like John, you go to those meets and the pressure doesn't get to him. He acts like he's a lot older than 14,'' Patmos said. ``But I think those meets are really good experience.''

The meet will give Renee Viveros, a Palmdale resident who attends Alemany High of Mission Hills, an opportunity to swim against some of America's best with staff members of the Mexican national team on hand. Viveros has a good chance to qualify for the country's Olympic team.

Next year's Janet Evans meet will even attract more world-class swimmers. The event moves to the soon-to-be-constructed Olympic Trials pool in Long Beach. The biggest day for Canyons will be when the club members will be in charge of running the event on one of the days.

``That will be good for the kids,'' Patmos said.

--Commuters: With more than a dozen swimmers hailing from the Antelope Valley, Canyons should have its own carpool lane on the 14 Freeway.

``It shows a lot of dedication, driving down here every day,'' Patmos said.

The team has two summer workouts four times a week, once in the morning in Sylmar and the other in the early evening. So many of the younger swimmers have to ride back and forth for the 35- to 45-mile drive from College of the Canyons to Lancaster and Palmdale.

For Highland High's Michele Kumaus, she's now killing the time at teammates' houses and breakfast outings between workouts. And since she drives, she has the option of driving home to Palmdale for a quick nap. But when she was younger, her parents, Michele and Dan, racked their odometers.

Both her mom and dad worked in the San Fernando Valley, so when it came time to get to a morning workout, they'd drive up to the Antelope Valley, drive Michele back and forth and somehow get back to work.

``It really is a brutal drive,'' Kumaus said. ``People don't understand how tiring driving is.''

Chris Cocoles, [phone]

chris.cocoles(at)dailynews.com