OCTOBER OPEN MEET WRAP UP

We were very encouraged with the effort that was put out by all of our Junior Blue, Junior Gold and Senior Prep groups in the meet this past weekend.  The hard work that each of you are putting in shows in the way you raced over the weekend.  The way you approached those blocks and the way all of you exploded off into your starts showed us you came to race.  Great Effort.

We saw a big improvement with your underwater dolphins and streamlines, and make no mistake about it this is an area that needs your focus and constant attention during practice.  The coaches can not watch every single turn and it is easy for you to fall into the trap of taking a wall off.  I would say to you that if this is you, the old saying applies “You are only cheating yourself” and it will show up when you least expect it.  Take ownership these are your races to win or lose, no one else’s.  Perfect those streamlines and dolphin kicks.  The next natural progression now is to put in that good breakout stroke to carry your speed off the starts and turns.

We notice a couple of things on our turns that need our attention.  One of the big things is to get more aggressive in and out of those walls.  The wall is not one of those rest stops you see around the highways.  We need to get in and out of those turns as fast as we can, the reason, nothing good happens around the walls.  Coach Logan reminded me of something I use to try and get her to do, and that is increase your kick a little around those walls.  The reason.  Simple it will increase your speed to help you get in and out of that area.  The other thing we need to do is to work on setting up your last breath a couple of strokes away from the wall as to maintain that speed into the turn.  And for goodness sake pull with your bottom arm and breathe on the second stroke off the turn.  Let’s approach your turns in practice with a little more urgency to improve our races.

We are having a little trouble with our head position when executing our short axis (breast fly and IM) turns.  After we make contact and begin our transition our head should keep looking into the wall until our hand leaves the wall.  This is important and will allow you to get into a tighter streamline when pushing off.    Below is a short video to help you better understand.

Let’s keep up the good work at practice as we head into the month of November and the Marlin and Swim and Rock meets!   As the weather starts to turn let’s also make sure we have those sweatshirts on and hoods on to keep us warm.  We what to keep those germs away so we are not missing school and practice, and wash those hands a lot and do not share water bottles.  

RACE PREPARATIONS

Do you go into a meet or more specifically your races with a checklist, or do you just wing it and hope for the best results, and if good your confidence is high.  The only problem is that sometimes the results don’t meet your expectations.  Now what?  Do you fall apart and let it create negative feelings about yourself as a swimmer 🏊.

In the book “The Swimmers Mind” it talks about having a checklist ✅ with five performance priorities.  They are “Process, Presence, Enjoyment, Standards, and Control.”  Let’s look at these further. 

 We have always talked about how it is important to trust your training and the process that has gotten you to that exact moment you step onto the block. We don’t focus on the outcome of the race, or that Jo or NASA cut.  Now I’m not saying that those things aren’t important to you, but when your whole mindset is on those things you forget to race and perform the specific things during your race that you have been working on.  The Process!

The next ✅ mark is your presence of mind. We have actually talked about that during practice the last couple of weeks.  Without getting half way through practice I hear things like Are we going outside for dry land or can we do this or that, and this is in the middle of a set when your focus should be the set and what we are trying to accomplish.  Coaches can often predict a swimmers success or lack of just by observing your mental presence at the pool. As we have said before, just by showing up does not mean that you are practicing.  The same goes for when you step up on those blocks at a meet.  The race that is right in front of you should be the only thing on your mind, and as you stand behind the block you should be able to mentally see yourself starting and swimming that race.  That’s it nothing else matters, stay in the Presence at all times.

Enjoyment is the next ✅ mark you need to make.  Don’t forget that first time you jumped into the pool for your first race.  My guess is that you probably were not even aware of your time.  You were however aware of the challenge and the fun you had getting to the other end, through your little eyes it probably looked like a football field.  But you made it and you wanted to do it again.  Your older now and the races come with different challenges and pain, but that is what makes it so fun for you, and you can’t wait 😊 for that next race.  Look at all your events through the eyes of that little one not so long ago where the only thing that mattered was making it to the other end as fast as you could and maybe just maybe you beat some people along the way.

The next item on your checklist are the Standards that you set for yourself.  I know that as your coach I have set standards for each group and I will hold myself and you to those.  I expect the same from each of you.  When you step up on that block you should not only expect your best, but you should demand nothing less than your best.  If you are looking for that positive mindset you need to start taking pride in everything you do. Set your standards high.

The last item to check off is Control.  We have talked about the way you carry yourself on and off the deck.  At practice you arrive early and instead of just throwing yourself on the ground with your phones 📲, just maybe you do some light stretching to prepare your body for what you are about to ask it to do.  Take ownership of your swimming, don’t let others determine your fate.   This also goes for the way you approach the meets.  Walk onto that pool deck with a positive mindset, stand upright with shoulders back and go about your business and don’t let others get in the way.  I remember last year at the winter classic when during the warmup a swimmer hoped into our lane to finish warmup.  A few of you became annoyed that she just kept going.  She was in your head and through you off your game.  You know what needs to be done during warmups and warm down and you should not let outside influences get in the way.  Don’t let these outside experiences trigger negative emotions to throw you off your game.   

Stay in that positive mindset.  This is not magic it’s something that has to be practiced daily.  It takes hard work just like your swimming.  Start practicing this today and you will not only become a better swimmer, but a better person.

GO GET THAT POSITIVE MINDSET!

TALKING to YOURSELF

It’s 5 o’clock in the morning, time to goggle up and dive into the old watering hole for practice.  First words to coach are not hello but more like “I’m tired” and is it going to be hard today?  Not a great mindset to start a workout that is meant to get you to your goals, right.  The way you talk to yourself is as important as what you do in the pool, and what you eat.  If you say something enough subconsciously you start believing it and acting it out.

 

All the hard work you put in, the talent that you have and the physical ability you possess won’t help you in a race if you have a negative mindset, sure you may get lucky and have a good race once in a while but in the long run you will always come up short.  The attitude and overall outlook with which you approach your workouts, your swims, your meets, your warmups, your races and the sport as a whole will determine your success in the long run.  What you think on a daily basis the attitude that you portray your swimming both at and away the pool has a direct impact on your performance.  

 

There are two mindsets that each of you possess, the negative mindset which is when “confidence is low, the desire to compete isn’t quite there, you’re not really enjoying yourself, and you’re not focused on your race."  Then we have the positive mindset where “ confidence is high, you have the desire to compete, you’re really enjoying yourself, and you’re completely focused on your race.”  Like in Star Wars it’s the struggle of “the force or the dark side.”   The inner struggle between the two is real and difficult but the more you can stay with the force and feel good about yourself the better the better your performances will be.  Stay with Chewbacca and the force!

 

Think about this, you have a really bad swim and you don’t understand why.  One of the hardest thing as coaches we have to do is talk you off the cliff and get you to understand that as athletes this happens all the time only in swimming its much more in your face because of the 0:00::00.  Just because you had a bad swim does not mean that you did something wrong or all of a sudden you’ve become a bad swimmer, but unfortunately that’s the way we often look at it, and as a direct result we start drifting towards the “dark side.”  The key is having a positive mindset not only when workouts and races are going well, but learning to control that inner struggle with ourselves and staying in a positive mindset when things don’t go your way, and they will from time to time.  Now there are those times where you will have those races accompanied by less than desired results and it could be from missing practice, coming back from illness, lack of race strategy, or your technique was off.  Maybe you have been working on something different in practice and this is the first time you used it in a race and the result was below your expectations.  This will happen, but your mindset and the way work through it will determine how fast you are able to bounce back.  

 

Let’s face it, staying in a positive mindset when things are going well and you're dropping time is easy.  Like a birthday it’s your day with cake and ice cream after every race.  It’s when things go wrong that the hard work begins when there is a bad time, no cake and ice cream not even a present to unwrap.  If you have worked on the way that you talk to yourself getting through these times will be easy. The first step in all of this is not to let yourself get to high or sink so low.  Think of your emotions as a scale from 0-5. (0__1___2__3__4__5).  The more you can keep your emotions in check between the 3 and the 4 the easier it will be to stay in a positive mindset.

 

FILL THE BUCKET

PLUG THE LEAKS!

Now that we have our first meet of this young season in our bags, it’s time to look forward and see where we go from here.  That meet is done and we saw some great things from you all with the areas that we have been working on.

One area that I really wanted to see you buy into is that of becoming more of a process oriented swimmers as oppose to a results only swimmer.  We had talked about taking more of an approach of looking at the place you came in as opposed to your time in the race.  This was the first step in trying to change your mindset to help you become a better swimmer.  In the coming days and weeks we will delve further into this area.

In the first step I want you to think of your swimming as a bucket that contains everything that
contains everything you need to be successful in your swimming endeavors.  The fuller you can keep
your bucket the more you are able to draw from during your races.  The things that you should be
filling your buckets with might include the following;

OUTSIDE THE POOl                                                

• Proper sleep
• Proper hydration 
• Proper diet
• Keep up with school work
• Stay in a positive mind set

AT THE POOl

• Show up for practice
• Have the right mindset
• Have your water and DRINK IT
• Focus in on the sets
• Finish every set
• Streamline off every wall
• Dolphin off every wall fast
• Stop breathing on breakout stroke

What in the world does this have to do with a bucket.  Let’s use your imagination here and think of this bucket as something that you carry with you not only to practice but also to every meet.  The 

more of these things, or others that you may think of that you can add to this bucket the more chances  you will have to be successful as a swimmer.

The trick here is to try and keep the bucket filled because undoubtedly leaks are going to occur such as a missed practice, an illness, a negative thought and the list goes on, but you have to keep plugging those leaks in the bucket.  The more you can keep those leaks to a minimum the better your chances are and by all means DON’T open the faucet at the bottom where you let everything we have worked on fall apart!

PRISONERS OF THE MOMENT

With the first meet of the young season it’s time take what we’ve learned and move on.  As I be already told you I’m not a big fan of watching the score board this early in the season and although it can be a good read at times it doesn’t always give the entire story.  At this time of the year I take more enjoyment in watching you do the things well that we have been working on in practice, that is true progress no matter how the scoreboard reads.  

Two of the things we have tried to hammer the first few weeks of practice are the way we work our streamlines and underwater dolphins off the wall and the way we finish our races.  I saw a lot of great effort being put forth in these areas and believe are making some real progress that will carry us to some amazing results in March and April.

An area that I see we all have to work on and be better at is the way we talk to ourselves.  We need to have a lot more positive self talk and less negative self talk.  We talk about this all the time and have pointed out that the way you talk to yourself has more to do with your confidence or lack of than anything else you do.  This is as important if not more important than anything you do at practice.  Your first thought after getting a bad time is that was terrible, I did awful and I heard this over the weekend.  Make no mistake about it times do matter especially in the world we live, it provides instant gratification,.  But we have to dive deeper into this story because it is just important to focus and prioritize the quality of the race as it is the final results.  If you have accomplished everything that you have been working on in practice and are making progress then that should have been an awesome experience..   Understand this simple fact as coaches we can pretty well write your story line by the way you talk, and the way you walk as you walk onto a pool deck.  We can also write the second chapter watching you work though your warmup.  The biggest opponent that you will always face is the one “ between your ears” and it’s how we talk to that opponent that will go a long way in determining success or failure.

At this point of the season we should be taking more enjoyment from the quality of your races and not become a “prisoner of the results.”  As we talked about last week you are going to experience a wide range of emotions in swimming 🏊 as in life ranging from moments of pure joy all the way to those of pure agony.   My most memorable moment from playing rugby🏉 in college during a championship tournament. After three days and 5 games we had made it to the championship game and after 80 minutes we were headed to extended time.  Towards the end after a scrum I picked up the ball and headed for the try line and after diving realized I had come up about a foot short and would lose a few minutes later.  The bottom line is that although devastated I realized both teams played hard and I actually had more fun in that losing effort than any other game from the realization that I was exhausted and had left everything that day between the white lines.

Your always going to have those races that despite losing, or not getting your best time, the race itself was just an awesome experience to be part of.  It could have been one of those races that you and your opponent were head to head all the way to the finish but you ended up losing by .001.  It may have been a race that after your opponent got out to a huge lead you ran them down at the wall.  Maybe you had a great start,

                                                                                                                                                                                                  followed by a not so great turn only to have a great finish.  

Think about how challenging your races and other events are instead of what the outcome may be.  This is when swimming becomes fun and exciting instead of always being consumed by the end result, the time.  That can be boring and believe me you will fail often if all you worry about is the time.

In the end it comes down to this simple phrase “Trust your training” and believe in yourselves and it starts with the way you talk to yourself.

MEET CHECK LIST

So our first meet of our journey this season has arrived, AKUMA MATATA.   No problems, no worries this weekend.  We understand that all swimmers are looking for a best time, a lofty goal indeed.  Let’ s look at that a little closer.  Depending on your age and the level you are at, the last Big meet you were in, we may need to manage our expectations a bit.  

For a lot of our 12 and under’s those fast swim seem like they will never end, like the energizer  bunny🐰 they just keep coming. For the  Senior Prep group we know what’s around the corner just waiting for us.  All I am saying is that remember the “process” that is the 🔐 key to unlocking those goals and dreams.

The things I will be watching for at this meet are 

1. How you approach and handle warmup and warm down
2. How you handle that second warmup
3. How well you keep warm waiting for your race
4. Do you know your events, or do you have to ask
5. Can you find your name, heat and lane on meet sheet, do you know your name (you’d be surprised kids who can’t find their name
6. How are your underwater dolphins off the walls
7. How is your breathing in and off your turns
8. Are you aggressive into your turns

These are the things that we have worked on for the first few weeks, and are the areas that will help you get to your goal when crunch time is staring you in the face.  Here are some reactions that you may face this weekend or for that matter at any swim meet or just everyday events.

Let’s start with the 🐘 elephant in the room, the one reaction no one likes to talk about and that is DISAPPOINTMENT.  Your fingers hit that touch pad and you look up and realize that all your effort was wasted and immediately you may feel that you failed and let everyone down.  I would say to you that the only way you fail is if you don’t get back up and get right back to it. Period

Along that thought is the ANNOYED  😑 reaction and I see this a lot.  This is where you may have won the race or heat but did not get that goal or best time.  Or maybe you get that goal time but don’ t win the race or heat.  In this situation I would say to you take the victory no matter how small it is and move on.  The one constant in this sport is the longer you get to do it the less victories you will experience, and again enjoy the process of the sport.  

Staying in the same mindset the next reaction is being ANGRY😡. This is the one that bothers me the most as a coach.  It’s the one is that you move past being disappointed and annoyed and become visibly angry and may say something or throw your goggles, your cap or maybe even slap the water and get the timers all wet. As a coach my first thought is great how am i going to deal with this and get them to understand that they were wrong and that’s unacceptable.  Those poor goggles and cap or even the officials had nothing to do with your swim.  The only person in that lane between those lane lines was YOU.   Take ownership accept the results, grow as a person and move on.  

The next reaction is the swimmer who may be EMOTIONLESS.  That stone cold 🥶 swimmer look. This is a hard one and can be both funny 😄 and frustrating at the same time.  It’s hard to know we’re this swimmer is mentally, do they just don’t care 🤷🏻‍♂️ or are they ready to explode and are just holding it in.  Again let’s talk and let me know either way and we can deal with it together, learn and move on.

The next reaction that you may encounter is that of EXHAUSTION.  Regardless of your performance and the outcome, you know you left it all in the  pool.  Your tank is empty.  This should be a good feeling regardless of the result.

As you see we are progress through a wide range of emotions that can occur and the next one is that of SHOCK.  You know the one where you have that race that came out of nowhere.  The one that you didn’t think you had in you.  I remember a few years ago when we were in Lancaster and at finals this 12 year old had a breaststroke race that was crazy and she looked back and you could see she was thinking, What just happened?  They use different sayings for this such as being in a zone, or more appropriately for you all being the GOAT for that one race at that moment..

The next emotion that you may experience is just being SATISFIED.   All of us have experienced that feeling of hitting simple little goals and the little  wink 😉 of the eye standing tall with our shoulders up and our chest pumped out a little.  We’re making progress and we know it.  This is an emotion we need to have more often understanding  that even in failure there are victories and we need to look for them and grow with them into better athletes and people.

The last emotion that you may encounter and one of the sweetest is of PURE JOY.  You know that one where you get that cut to the big meet, you qualify for finals, you break that final barrier and get to the  awards 🥇 🥈🥉 podiums and everything has paid off

As an athlete you are going to come face to face with this wide spectrum of emotions and not only in the pool but in your every day lives and I put it to you, the most important thing you can do it keep getting up and move forward both in the pool and your daily lives.  There is always another challenge to be faced and another door  🚪 to be opened.  

WILL YOU BE BRAVE ENOUGH TO OPEN IT AN GO THROUGH,  That’s the challenge in life

LANGUAGE

This past week as we were working through our workouts in the pool in both the Gold and the Prep group I heard this language come out of some of you, WHAT IF I CAN’T?  Think about that for a second.  I read and article recently by Oliver Leroy and so what I will attempt to do here is paraphrase what he was trying to get across for our purposes.  Think about this You are asked by a group of friends to go hang out but immediately you respond by saying, I can’t I have to go to practice.  Instead of looking at this situation in the concept of “I Have To” and understanding  that you don’t have to go to practice and work hard and that this is something that “You Get To Do”, your training will not only get better but you will also have more fun doing it.

 

  Whatever you’re doing daily the language that you use can have a direct impact on your mindset in all your activities.  When you use the phrase I have to it, it has the connotation that a bit of effort will be involved that is going to cause a bit of unpleasantness .“I have to do my homework. I have to go to bed early tonight.  I have to walk the dog.  I have to eat dinner. I have to go to practice. I have to work harder.  I have to swim faster today.  I have to win the race.  I have to be more motivated.  When you have to do something, it’s clear you don’t want to do it.”  Wait before you respond, think about it You like that dog, you love swimming and hanging out with your buddies and listening to me, okay maybe not that last part so much.  The language that you use and I hear often tells a whole different story.  The language that I hear causes unpleasantness and stress that has a direct relationship on your effort and motivation.  It makes things harder then they have to be.  When you have to the "context is clear, you don’t want to do it."

 

Listen we know that swimming and for that matter any sport that you participate in can be hard and get’s harder at every level. There are always things in any sport that athletes  do not want to do day to day. Going to morning practice, giving up a weekend for a long meet, attending finals to support your teammates/friends even though your not swimming.  But oh, how you do love it and always have since you first jumped in as a little girl/boy and had that glorious first swim and smell of chlorine.  Sometimes the way we talk to ourselves we unintentionally make the situation harder than it has to be.

          

 

This language becomes so normal in your every day thought process that it starts to “pepper down into how you talk to yourself in swimming.”   Using the words “I have to” is is being forced to do the thing you love working hard and swimming fast. We've talked before about mental toughness and taking control of the language you use and the way you talk to yourself.  We talked about word replacements when talking to ourselves and I want you to stop and think about the possibilities if instead of saying I have to, you change one simple word and say “I get to.”  That one little word change not only takes away unnecessary stress but also opens doors and creates a lot of opportunities and makes things a little more interesting.  

 

Not everybody is given the opportunity to do something that they love to do, and what I would like to do is challenge you to change your mindset.

• “I get to do this sport"
• “I get to challenge myself daily"
• “I get to see what I am made of"
• “I get to swim fast today"
• I get to bond with my teammates 

 

I get to will remind you that you could be " somewhere else doing something else, but no you Choose to be here in this moment taking things to the limits.”  Saying I get to reminds you how lucky you are to be able to have a pool you can use and participate in a sport you love that allows you to step up and race.  No one is making you do this.  Don’t fight the  voices between your ears, remember who you are, and how strong you are. Take everything you have and do something with it.  It starts with believing in yourself and changing your mindset with the language you use.