The York Y Rambler.  1 November 2006.

 

 

 

The York Y Rambler, by Coach Michael

 

 

BIG RACING WEEKEND

 

Note that a significant portion of the team will be competing in the Big Cat USA invitational this weekend, primarily on Friday and Saturday, at Penn State.  We’ve had a good start to the season thus far; let’s take a big stride forward at State College.  Meet information has already been distributed in participants’ mailboxes.

 

Big Cat warmup news:  the meet is a bit larger than the hosts had anticipated, so the warm-ups are being split into two parts for the afternoon session on both Saturday and Sunday.

On Saturday we are in the second part, from 2:55 to 3:15 [note that this is only twenty minutes, which isn’t enough; the “warmup pool” will be open during the meet and we will do much of our warmup in there.]  I want all afternoon racers to be at the pool by 2:00 pm.  As a rule, I like my swimmers to be at the pool at least 1 hour and 15 minutes before a session begins.  This leaves sufficient time to get dressed, stretch, warmup thoroughly, and do whatever else needs to be done to prepare and focus on the racing to come.

 

On Sunday, we are in the second part, from 1:55 to 2:15.  Same info re the “warmup pool.”  And I want all our swimmers to be at the pool by 1:00 pm.

 

BIG TRAINING WEEKEND

 

For those left behind from Big Cat, we will have our regularly scheduled practices both on Friday evening and on Saturday morning.

 

 

HOW WE DO THINGS HERE (& WHY)…

 

Mark your calendars:  next Wednesday 8 November, from 5:30 to 6:30 pm, we will have a parents meeting with Coach Michael in the Loucks Room at the Y.  I will be discussing developmental training (how we decide who does how much how often, and what results we can expect if we do, etc.) and meets (how we pick them, how we decide what to swim, what is the purpose of racing and the meets we attend, etc.).  I chose the time to straddle the two practice sessions, and I hope each team family will have at least one parent in attendance.

 

WORDS OF WISDOM

 

“It takes a lot of unspectacular preparation to get spectacular results.”

Roger Staubach, Hall of Fame quarterback

 

 

SAY CHEESE…

 

The Y would like all of our swimmers to stop by the front desk in the very near future to get their pictures taken for the swipe cards that we will be using soon.  It appears that many of our younger kids have already had their pictures taken, but that most of our older swimmers have not.  Please note that you do not have to get your hair done first, nor wear a dress or suit and tie to get your picture taken here.  Informal is acceptable.

 

 

THE NON-COMPARTMENTALIZATION OF LIFE

 

It is often – maybe even usually – the case that swimmers will focus on technique during a “technique set,” looking beautiful, graceful, efficient, and bringing a tear of joy to their coach’s eye; then five minutes later – in a “normal” set – ignore everything they just worked on, apparently trying to beat the water into submission and looking god-awfully ugly.

 

It is often – maybe even usually – the case that swimmers will focus on their walls and underwater dolphins during a “walls set,” looking as good and fast and powerful as Natalie Coughlin or Ian Crocker; then five minutes later – in a “normal” set – ignore everything they just worked on, pushing off walls weakly, sloppily, with no dolphins and awful breakout strokes.

 

It is often – maybe even usually, etc. etc.  You get the picture.

 

Kids compartmentalize their thinking and effort:  work walls only on walls sets, work technique only on technique sets, swim fast only on sprint sets, etc.  This situation is common, yet problematical, since by practicing like this we make little progress.  No focus from one set transfers to anything else that we do.  So we work on technique for 12% of the time, instead of 100%.  We work on walls for 14% of the time, instead of 100%.  Etc.  We quarantine our particular excellences, not letting them “infect” any other aspect of our swimming, as if good walls, or good technique, were a disease.

 

But when we race, we need good technique AND good speed AND good endurance AND good walls.  If we want to be able to put all these things together, and even more, if we want to be able to do that under the stress and fatigue of the last 1/3 of the race, we need to practice these skills and develop these capacities with all of our training, not just a small portion of it.  Good walls all the time.  Good technique all the time.  Good speed all the time.  This is difficult, but so is swimming fast.

 

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

 

Are you practicing to succeed, or practicing to fail?