THE TRAFFIC LIGHT

 

SENIOR PREP.  So what were we trying to accomplish yesterday at practice with those 200’s and the 50’s at the end.  Now you all may have thought it was some type of game and in a way it might have been, and you may know it better as the sling slot set.  However we were also trying to teach you how to go about YOUR business and practice carefully but properly.

One of the positives that has come out of this year is the fact that we are only swimming 4 in a lane giving all of you a great opportunity to really work on your techniques and race strategies.  As coaches we are able to really help you with your longer swims (200's) and you should seize on this opportunity and really try on making some big improvements.  To many times a swimmer looks at a particular event or distance and immediately their mindset goes from being relax and comfortable to one of instant fear, and sometimes you need to stare that fear down in order to move

forward.  Again it's all about moving out of your comfort zone and if you are able to do that anything is possible.

Yesterday, as we watched you work through your 200's we saw a lot of you swimming on the feet of the person in front of you.  Everyone pushed off to start the set with good intentions but as you closed on the person in front of you the yellow caution light went off in your head and you slowed to a crawl in some instances, and eventually causing each of you hitting the red light at the wall.  

Have you ever been in the car with mom or dad on the interstate where there is a car in front of them that is moving at a slower pace.  Do your parents slow down?  Okay maybe a little bit until an opportunity arises and they signal,  move over and accelerates to get around.  Does the driver in front stop?  No that would create a traffic mess.  As we worked on the 50's at the end of practice we were attempting to get you accustomed to being able to pass the swimmer in front of you by "getting skinny" and going down the middle.  this is wy it is important to stay to the right and leave the middle open for a passing lane.  If coach Paul and I can get "skinny"

and pass people when we swim, you should have no problem.  The key is to alert them with either a tap on the foot as you pass or a small brush of the legs as you are passing, not hard its all about communicating with each other.

One of the reason we got from a lot of you was that you don't pass because you don't want to be mean.  We have to move away from that thought to this mindset, if I pass them I am helping myself improve along with helping them.  I remember 2 years ago at the holiday classic when the senior prep group was warming up in the Recreation pool at Mason.  The incident involved a swimmer from another team who during warmups just kept going passing people flipping at the wall and just basically going through her routine.  To her credit she was not going to allow outside distractions get in her way.  Our girls became very frustrated and maybe a little intimidated because this was new.  Did it get into their heads and affect their performance, maybe or maybe not, but why not be prepared.

We will visit this set again very soon, you can be assured of that.

JUNIOR GOLD  So little ones what were we trying to accomplish this week during practice as we are sure you were a little confused as to why we were doing the exact same practice on Monday and Wednesday.  Good observation if you caught it.  During the meet this past week we notice a few technical flaws from our groups and what we decided is that it was not from lack of effort but from our body position.  An easy fix if you are patient and really focus on what your doing and how your body feels during practice.  It may feel to you that it's feels easy, but if you are patient we will all emerge as faster swimmers.

Some key points from this week.  One of the things we were trying to get you to focus on is staying tall while doing the drills, thinking of your body as one giant "vessel" that has to have all the parts working together.  Our drills this week were not new and included;

HAND LEAD

HEAD LEAD

Two other drills and terms we used were stroke counts and sneaky breaths.  Why stroke counts?  All of you have heard the old saying "Less is Better".  Guess what in swimming this is all so true.  When you are taking the same amount of strokes on each length you become so much more efficient which translates into faster times.  When working on your stroke counts, we pointed out that you have to visualize a point on the bottom of the pool where you are consistently doing your breakouts on every single wall.

These drills will help you with your body position while at the same time keeping your body in a good position while reducing drag thus making your swimming more efficient and faster. Be patient.  We spend some of the practice going through these drills and than have a little of the practice using what we have done here into a small training segment to see how it all come together for your races.

And you taught swimming was just diving in and going.  Hopefully doing these things correctly that is exactly what happens on RACE DAY.