“WIN”. What’s Important Now

DISTANCE  MEET INFORMATION This week end our groups will have 27 swimmers attending the distance meet swimming either the 1650 or the 1000 free at LEE DISTRICT POOL.  Look at this event as a challenge and a great way to start off the new year.  If you would like to opt out feel free to join me at SANDY STATE PARK for the POLAR BEAR swim on THURSDAY. A few of you asked how to swim this, and the first thing is to attack  it similar to a 500, but just a little more conservatively.  first thing start out as relax as possible and be sure to BREATHE a lot in the first 100 (every 3 or 2-3-2). For the first 200 try to settle into a good rhythm and holding a straight line.  Stay away from circle swimming, stay on your center line.  Avoid looking at the counter on every lap, instead concentrate on keeping a long smooth stroke, with power full turns and getting as much as you can from each wall. Check numbers when you need to and reassess as you go along; How am I feeling?  Can I hold thi

 I WOULD LIKE TO WISH ALL OF YOU AND YOUR FAMILIES A HAPPY NEW YEAR. It was great to see a lot of our group make the effort over the holidays to get to the old water hole for practice   .   The effort that you all made will show in the next few weeks as we move into the next phase of our season, which is the meat and potatoes    portion of. the training cycle all ending with    whatever championship meet you qualify for in March.   Now with 2014 behind us it is time to look forward and re dedicate our efforts in and out of the pool to put you in the best position to succeed in this sport.    As your work load in the pool increases during this period, so do the demands in school with the end of the quarter and all the midterm exams, reports, and projects   .   It is important that you plan accordingly and keep on top of things.   This involves getting extra rest    when you can, making your workouts on  schedule (a missed workout is a missed workout), being mentally prepared for ea

Please read this article from Annie Grevers in Swimming World . 5 Ways to Turn Christmas Training Fear into Cheer By Annie Grevers TUCSON – The Christmas Training season can certainly create some anxiety for a swimmer as the standard routine of swim-school-swim-homework-sleep suddenly becomes wide open. Instead of fearing the added training opportunities, you can learn to embrace them. 5 Ways to Turn Christmas Training Fear into Cheer 1) Oh what fun it is to train on a school-free, open day! How often do you get to devote all your energies to your favorite sport? Never. Take advantage of this break from scholastic curriculum and exercise the brain as you stare down that black line in your lane. Christmas training is not often lumped in with our favorite holiday traditions, but the novelty of swimming without the stress of school is to be celebrated. The best swimmers do not just log laps. They think about every angle of every portion of every stroke they

FRIDAY DECEMBER 19 As we enter into this holiday season it just so happens that we have come to the end of the first training phase that  I designed for our groups back in August. I have spent this week looking back over the plan to see what kind of adjustments need to be done as we move forward.  I will also take some time the next 2 weeks to review everyone goal sheets to see where we stand as we move forward into cycle 2 of the program.We actually started cycle two of our program this past Monday and even though it was different for each group there was a little more emphasis put on drills.  As we talked about we will be doing a couple of drills for each strokes during the next few weeks as we get ready to enter into the heavy training cycle leading up to the March championship season.  Senior Prep swimmers please remember we have some high school swimmers who will begin their championship seasons at the end of January. I know as the holiday season comes around a lot of you thin

THURSDAY  DECEMBER 4 TODAY's THOUGHT  MISTAKES We have spent a lot of time the past few weeks talking about fixing the little things at practice.  We have talked about taking the advice (constructive criticism) that is given to you after a race back to the pool and working on correcting it. These little things could  include any of the following; having a breathing pattern, not  breathing last 5 yards into turns or  first stroke coming out of your turns, aggressive swimming in and out of turns, and finishing strong into walls.  Looking over my notes from  the swim and rock meet there are some other things that need our attention such as; aggressive breakouts and pull outs, having some good FAST distance under water off the walls especially the first one .  When breathing in breast and fly events we need to think forward movement instead of up and down.  The last note that we can all work on is tighter streamlines. Setting up your practice is always a challenge as I try

TUESDAY DECEMBER 2 PRACTICES :  All will be held as normal except Saturday morning which is cancelled due to the meet. MAKO INVITATIONAL: WARM- UP TIMES SATURDAY 11-12 (7:00-7:35) 10 AND UNDER (11:25-11:55) 13 AND OVER (2:55-3:35)     SUNDAY 11-12 (7:00-7:35)  10 AND UNDERS (10:45-11:15)  13 AND OVERS (2:40- 3:10) POSITIVE CHECK IN SATURDAY 200 FREE/200 BREAST/ 200 FLY   SUNDAY 200 IM/ 200 BREAST ATTIRE:   Only Mako caps are to be worn during the meet!!  You have no choice except not to swim.  I am getting tired of seeing other caps, and by the way I don't have one is a excuse and they are easy to come up with  PACKING A BAG FOR A SWIM MEET SHOULD INCLUDE THE FOLLOWING TEAM SUIT : always bring a spare, this may be the meet where it rips TEAM CAP:   again bring extras they rip TEAM UNIFORM:   wear your team tee on deck and show your spirit, bring a sweatshirt also to stay warm on the pool deck GOGGLES: again bring extras.  I have seen many break right before a race.

NOVEMBER 28 Hope all of you had a wonderful thanksgiving with your families.  I am sure you enjoyed getting away from the pool, and the smell of chlorine for a day.  It is now time to get back in the pool and have that last push for our meets in December. SWIM AND ROCK MEET WRAP UP Although it was a very long weekend, our Senior Prep and Junior Gold and Junior Blue groups had an outstanding weekend of swimming. Both Friday and Saturday we had 40 swimmers who made finals later in the evening.  We had some Pa. cuts achieved and a lot of JO cuts attained and a lot of personal best throughout the weekend.   Over the weekend I had many swimmers come to me after their races and I ask, "So how was that?" and the answers ranged from "Good", "Not So Good", "Bad" or "Terrible".  My first thought is to ask them if they are talking about the time or the race.  Don't get me wrong as a coach I know how important that time is to the athlet

THURSDAY NOVEMBER 13 I need to start with some housekeeping items from last week. First off I missed some of our high school students that are trying out for their high school teams this week. I guess they grow up so fast that it's hard to think of them as starting high school, but I do want to mention that Andrew H. Emma L. And Gillian G. Have also been trying out this week. Also in our Saturday meet a couple of weeks ago Graham Evers swam his first 400 IM. SWIM AND ROCK MEET : This is a prelim and finals meet Friday and Saturday which means the top 16 (13 and overs) and the top 8 (11-12) will swim again in the evening. You need to check before leaving in the morning to see if you made finals. If you do not scratch ( coaches approval) and fail to show up you will be scratched from the rest of the meet. To fail to show up is bad sportsmanship and reflects badly on you, your coach, and Makos. Positive Check IN: THIS IS YOUR RESPONSIBILITY AND NOT THE COACHES. W

We are now into our 9th week of the season and with 3 meets behind us we are now getting ready for our mid-terms which are the next 3 big meets. Here is a look at what is coming up: SWIM AND ROCK MEET: NOVEMBER 21-22-23 @OAK MARR   This is a trails and finals meet on Saturday and Sunday and what that means is that the 11 and overs will swim prelims in the morning and the fastest 16 (13 and overs) and the fastest 8 (11-12 year olds) will return in the evening.  IF YOU MAKE THE FINALS YOU HAVE TO SHOW UP OR YOU NEED TO SCRATCH (COACHES APPROVAL) THE EVENT BEFORE LEAVING IN THE MORNING.  IF YOU DO NOT SCRATCH AND FAIL TO SHOW YOU WILL BE SCRATCHED FROM THE REMAINDER OF THE MEET. I am aware that we have a lot of swimmers trying to get cuts for Lancaster so we are treating this as a championship meet.  This means that you may dust off those fast suits and get them ready,  shave if you need to although I know that you will swim fast because you wear that MAKO cap and Heather Shannon an

As we are now into our 6th week of practice and with one meet in our rear view mirror I thought it might be time to get this blog started for the season. All athletes especially older ones will gather a certain amount of rust in the off season, and will have to spend the first part of the season working that rust off.  If your a baseball fan than you may notice that the pitchers always warm up to start the inning as they prepare to face the batters.  A swimmer too after sitting a while may have to do a 2nd or 3rd warm-up during the meet.   Yes it takes a little effort but it's often the little things that you may or may not do that will have the biggest impact on your races.  After reviewing last seasons body of work, I have decided that one of my big themes for this year will be the little things, and one of the biggest is being prepared and not wasting a single minute.  We can never get that minute back so we are going to use every one of them. All of you have been doing an

Saturday would give some of us a little more time to sleep as we sent Coach Peter. And the two 400 IM swimmers over early for warm ups, while the rest of us would arrive at 7:45 to start ours. Elena started the last day off by dropping over 11 seconds in her 400 IM, Fletcher had a great race only to come up a little short. Justin was our next swimmer dropping over 9 seconds in his 100 fly. The 50 fly saw some amazing swims with best times posted by Lexi, Anthony, Ian, Lauren, and Marcelo The 100 breast stroke saw great races by Faith, Anthony, and Kyle who all posted best times. Allison turned in a great 75 breast and fell a little short in that last 25 but we will keep working on that. Maggie was 2 seconds off her time but did enough to gain a spot in finals later in the day. Our little makos Justin and Katherine both posted best times in their 50 free. The last event of the day was the 200 free where Ellie, Lexi, Julia, Elena, all posted best times and Marcelo went under 1:50

FRIDAY and DAY 3 Today we all were up having breakfast early and than piled into the van and arrived for warm ups at 7:30. Today we found three lanes and had a pretty good warm up period. The younger kids would start their meet with the 100 IM and all three Mako swimmers Faith, Ellie , and Peter had best times. They would follow that with some incredible 100 backstroke swims with Lexi , Anthony , Peter , all posting best times. Lexi would be our only 100 fly in this group swimming a little off her time but setting her self up nicely for finals later in the evening. This group ended the day with the 100 free with Peter, Anthony, having two great swims. The 13-14 year olds began their day with the 100 back with Lauren, Maggie , Ian, all posting best times for the year. In the most exciting race between Mako swimmers Fletcher (2:22:46) would just out touch Kyle (2:22:49) in the 200 breast and making finals leaving Kyle 11th and on the outside looking in. The swimming gods must ha

WEDNESDAY FINALS and Day 2Thursday Wednesday night we had 3 relays along with 5 swimmers competing in the pool. Anthony was swimming the 200 back again and would swim another best time going 3 seconds faster from the morning.     Faith and Maggie would also swim the 50 breast stroke and both had great swims posting best times again.   Faith, Anthony ,Peter and Ian also had the 50 free at final. All three would post best times in the event. The 11 and 12 relay with Ellie, Lexi, Allison and Faith had a great swim. Both 13-14 relays did well with Ian, Fletcher, Marcelo , Kyle, Lauren Maggie, Elena and Julia . This would end the first day of racing for the Makos. Thursday Day 2 arrived early and we would drop off the 13-14 yearl olds early and go back for the 12 and unders. We had a real good warm up as we arrived a little later and allowed that first wave to clear the pool. The first event of the day was the 200 IM. and first up was Julia who set the tone

As most of you are enjoying your spring break, Mako swimming has 18 swimmers from our groups in Tampa Florida swimming in the NASA Showcase classic being held at the Long Center in Clearwater. We started our week off on Tuesday arriving at the pool at 9:00 am for a short practice. The ears were from the guard, just needed to set the record straight. Thanks girls!!! As we were getting ready for practice, I came to the conclusion that Allison Hickey's mom need some lessons on the proper way to apply lotion on a body. This is Allison on the far right below, notice the shoulder burn and this is all over her body. She tells me my mom sprayed number 50 all over. All I could say was yeah, all over every where except you. These are some shots as we ran through our meet warm ups. After practice we all piled in the van and headed back to the hotel, with some sad singing as I drove. We would meet down at Jimmy's F

The Final Act of the Meet  Some of the Mako faces 5:45 and here we go for day 4 and the last swims of the meet.  As I walked to the pool this morning it felt a little colder than when I left a few hours before.  Could that  be a sign of some sorts. We started the first session with a very good warm up withe the 13-14 year olds with Coach Peter in one pool and the 11-12 year olds in another pool with myself.  The session started with the 400 free relay and we had 5 entered.  The men and woman had an A relay each and the 13-14 year old men also had a B relay entered.  All 20 swimmers swam some strong 100's as we got ready for the individual events.  All 5 relays posted best times. We would start with the back stroke the older kids doing the 200 and the younger ones the 100.  We had 3 swims with Jackson posting a best time, and Julia dropping over 5 seconds. Next up was the 100 free were we had 7 swimmers entered, posting 5 best swims (Maggie, Lauren,, Gabby, Marcel