“Ke Nako”

This past weekend we saw a lot of outstanding races from our Senior prep, Junior Gold and Junior Blue groups.  Some qualifying times were made for the Junior Olympic meet in March.   Medals 🥇 and ribbons 🎀 were won by many swimmers 🏊‍♀️ in the groups, but more importantly a lot of improvements were seen not only in that “ all important time” for that instantaneous feedback but for myself I saw some great turns with improving underwater work off those walls.  We saw a lot of you try some new events which is a very important part of this process “always leave a door open” and we saw a great mental approach to the way you raced.  Overall you all were awesome👏  and now we have one more weekend to get through for the rest of you before the first stage of our season ends.

“Ke Nako”. 

This is the title of a song from the 2010 World Cup 🏟 and the translation to English is simply, “IT’s TIME”. You might want to look it up and maybe listen to it before this weekend.  Time for what; I guess if you need to ask we may be in a little trouble right now.  On September 10 you all began by jumping in the pool and starting your journey down what at times seems like an endless journey down a black line on the bottom of the pool, with the never ending smell of chlorine everywhere, body, hair,  clothes, towels just about anything you touch and through it all you have persevered and made great strides.

It’s time for the fun part about this sport, and simply put “it’s time to race”.  Pretty simple!  You have put in a lot of hard over the last 14 weeks, awesome test sets, some great walls and underwater work, a lot of improvements in our stroke work and racing techniques.  All of this in preparation if you may for our mid term exam to see where we are at as we march towards championship season in March.

As you enter this weekends meet understand this little thing that we your coaches know as fact; You are tougher and stronger, both physically and mentally than YOU think you are.  Believe in all the hard work that you have put into this and don’t let that little thing between your ears 👂 get in the way.  Instead of 🤔 thinking about all the negatives and about things that might go wrong, focus on the positives.  Picture that perfect race that is just sitting there waiting to be grabby, be the one who takes it.  Think thoughts that will put you in a position to be successful.  Let’s not do things that will make us slower and that includes thinking about your competition because chances are they are not wasting energy on you.  There may be things that happen over the weekend that will try and derail you, it happens to everyone not just you, but it’s about how you react at that moment that will dictate your overall success, and remember you are tougher mentally than you think.  One piece of advice if you find yourself a little anxious 😟 or stress, take a breather.  Get up and take a walk around the facility, get some fresh air and clear your mind.

Above all enjoy the moment, have fun and do what you do best, RACE!!!