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Showing posts from April, 2021

YOUR RACE

  It’s race day and if your like most young athletes the most important thing is the result of your competition.  Coaches are evaluating many different things during the competition, but we are human and the results    are important but not the end all.   Speaking for myself, one of the things I really look for and that you absolute  control of is, EFFORT.     You see  results can come in a variety of ways ranging from good, bad and downright ugly, but the effort that you put into those results is what matters the most.  Think about it and I know you have because during those little feedback talks after your race I hear a lot of  “ I think I could have done better” or “ I could have gone faster.”  What are you waiting for? No better time than the present.  I see it in your faces sometimes yes the results were good bu t in your ❤️ you know you had more to give and that feeling can be devastating to a young swimmer. You might ask yourself this, “ Am I applying myself as much as I can and

what were we accomplishing

 This past week we the gold, prep, and highs cool group started the week on Monday with the goal of finding a new comfortable.  As a swimmer often times we know what we have to do at practice in order to become more successful.  The problem is that often the things we have to do tend to make us uncomfortable during practice, it takes more focus, more effort and quite frankly, IT's HARD.   What is your comfort zone and why does it exists?  This is that area in which you swim to avoid anxiety and that feeling of pain that you fear and are afraid to confront when swimming fast and hard.  Sometimes you have set up these boundaries unconsciously not even knowing that you have done it.  There are many reasons for this such as, lack of confidence, fear of failure and yes fear of winning.  That's right if you swim in your comfort zone you have a built in excuse for just being average.  Think about that for a few minutes and the next time going into a meet.  Comfort zones are a "sa

LEARNING FROM A BAD RESULT

 Okay so your swim was not what you were expecting as you look towards the scoreboard.  Not the end of the world.  It also may not be the end of your meet, with more races ahead, so brush yourself off and let’s move forward.  Use this as an opportunity to grow, become stronger mentally and look towards your next opportunity to race.  Instead of making excuses or questioning your abilities, or your training when faced with a bad result, look for ways to learn, grow, and improve. We may not be superheroes, although as little kids we may have dreamed about having superpowers to do anything.  The fact of the matter is this; each of you are a superhero in your unique way.  “You have the power to alter your perception; to see things how you want to see them and interpret out experiences any way you see fit.” Do you understand what that mans?  It goes back to our discussion on self talk and the ability to change any negative thought or comment you have into a positive one.  Everything comes b

A BAD RESULT

  Okay, so the race didn't go as planned and you look at the scoreboard in horror.  Do you go into a downward spiral or do you take the path of looking for the positives that you can take from the race.  First off own your race, no excuses, so it was not a great race but neither was it terrible and you need to accept that sooner than later. Everyone will have those days when it seems like the universe is against you in your daily life and for our purposes your swimming.  The ability to understand this and what to do next will be key into what happens next.   It's understandable to fall into the trap of self doubt or self pity where you begin to question your swimming capabilities.  This sport is hard because we are always and sometimes too often looking at that clock for clarity in our efforts. The hard fact is that some days you going to have great swims, and at the same time there will be those days that are not so great.  The key is to understand that and to move forward fro

COPING

  How do you handle a bad result?  How do you view it?  Do you look at it as a failure?  Now guys you may be thinking to yourselves, oh no he’s on his soap box again, but rest assured I’m not.  I’ve been thinking about this all week and it stems from a couple of sets we were doing where fins were optional.   As we watched you work through these sets, we noticed that some of you were struggling towards the end and we asked you to put on your fins.  A couple responses were but I don’t want to because than I fail.  First off, no you didn’t fail.  The sets and interval were designed for the upper end of our group in the hopes that the others would be able to follow for as long as they could, and the entire group was great 👍. Our coping mechanism in this scene were the fins, and next time maybe we can go longer without them. Instead of looking at a bad result in anything you do as a bad result, ask yourself what you can do the next time out to produce a better result and the first thing yo

SQUARE PEG

  Our Junior Gold and Senior Prep swimmers spent some most of Wednesday working on our breaststroke.  Why do it?  I’m not  a breaststroke person,  but when we asked the kids if they liked or enjoyed the IM event a lot of hands shot up.  Of course our comeback was how can you enjoy the IM without having at least something that resembles a breaststroke and the clip below ain’t it people.  That’s how are older lap swimmers swim breaststroke and maybe with a few more birthdays I’ll be swimming like that.  If i do my daughters informed me that I will never find my equipment bag again. Now we aren’t looking for any world beaters in breaststroke, but as Coach Paul said they look like breaststroker’s now. On her way out Coach Wendy even mentioned that you all look better and all of this with just a little focus and some extra effort on trying something new. Now we understand that like the child above not everyone is alike and we are not going to get that square peg into the round hole, but are

TIME TO PLUNGE BACK IN

  With the end of spring break and the reality of getting back to school for your final quarter, its also time to turn our attention back to the pool. Now that first plunge and workout may feel a little awkward similar to the bear after a long winter hibernation and it may take a couple of workouts to get that feeling back.  It’s okay, don’t panic all is right in the world, you’ll be just fine. With a fresh new perspective and a clearer mindset it's time to refocus on your training habits such as, are you going to just stay the course, or are you going to attempt to change the way you practice.  It's time to put your bad swimming habits in a box and lock them down so that they can't get in your way to improving, and no matter how hard those bad habits want back in keep them  locked down. You all know the bad habits that we are talking about but in case they have slipped your minds here is the short list; getting in late (doesn't take 5 minutes to put on caps) lazy turns