POSITIVE VERSUS NEGATIVE

For all you Gold/Blue swimmers who came out this weekend to race, it was great to watch you.  As we watched you go through your events we were pleasantly pleased to see how much a lot of you improved especially in the breaststroke and butterfly events.  It goes to show how your hard work on those stroke days have really paid off.  The fact that your in that long course pool and are able to get into a good rhythm without the walls have helped all of you tremendously.

The work that we have done with those tempo trainers have been helpful in figuring out your pacing and as long as you combine that with your color chart you will continue to see those improvements.  This was very evident in those 400 free events.   It’s awesome to see it starting to come together for all of you.  Now you won’t see the big drops if any as those times come down. I will promise you this however, if you show up, work smart, work hard those great swims will be there at the right time.

Some of you will be ending long course after this week but regardless where you practice remember to work hard, play hard and have fun with your summer friends and teams.  Don’t forget summer swimming is about STARTS, TURNS AND FINISHES.Take them seriously.  RACE AND SCORE POINTS for your teams unless of course you swim for Oakton, Orange Hunt, or Mantua in which case feel free to head to the beach those weekends.

 Feed the positive.  Starve the negative.  Stay positive this summer and remember it’s about racing and scoring points.  Let’s not get wrapped up in times until around divisional.  If your lucky you may see time drops each week, but it’s hard to do.  So go into each meet with this thought, I own this race. Be the big dog and get your hand to the wall first.

Think about this statement, “You become what you feed your mind,” and it got me to think about it’s importance in swimming if not your life in general.  Can any of you say that you can have a healthy body by eating a steady diet of empty calories such as chips, candy or any other food filled with sugar that gives you that roller coaster ride of the ups followed by the, you guest it, the big downfall.  How do you expect to have positive performances in your swimming if you are constantly feeding your mind with a steady diet of negativity.  

It’s take as much training to train your mind as it does your body.  What in todays world it’s hard not to focus on some of the negative things from time to time.  The key was from time to time.  You can’t let the scary things out there overwhelm you to the point that it affects your performance.  At the same time it is unrealistic to have nothing but positive thoughts.  You need to come up with a balance that works for you and allows you to perform at your best even if does not always result in a best time.

Worrying for a few seconds during a meet or before a race is one thing but spending countless time in that dark hole worrying about things that most of the time are out of your control is just foolish and can become very contagious to those around you.  Not only are you own mind with junk food but you are force feeding those around you and now everyone is on that junk food mentality and quite frankly I can’t see any positives arising from that dark hole.

If anything choose your worries carefully and start talking positive a little more often and remember you can’t just mouth things like I’m going to go fast.  You need to believe it.  Saying it doesn’t make it so.

Feeding the positive starts with your thoughts and feelings.  It’s so easy to walk around feeding your negative side such as, I’m tied, or I don’t feel good.  You might even think why show up, I’m going to just get a good old fashion beat down.  Maybe so but that’s why we race.  Our team might face that this summer but I will promise you that we will show up and RACE.   If we get beat we will tip our caps, say good job and move on.  The alternative is to not swim and that’s not an option period.