I have a 12 year old son who has been swimming USA-s for 5 years.
He loves swimming.
He just came home from an intensive swim camp(overnite) that lasted 5 days.
He also attended this camp last year.
Last year when he returned from camp he was hesitant to return to his team. He loved the training at camp. I brushed it off.
This year he's upset about returning to his usa-s team again and quite disgusted. After 5 days of learn new drills and almost revamping mosts of his races he just regrets training with his team. He says he loves the people but hates the sets. He says they have been doing the same drills for the past 5 years.
Now as a parent I have observed the coach writing a workout on the white board and then just spacing off but since I'm a new swimmer..i figured..what did I know?
What do I do...change teams???? We are saturated here in western pa.
He's not a diva but a technically beautiful swimmer. And he loves his sport.
Would it hurt to drop a year around club and he would just swim middle school?? Or find him another USA-s team?
Thanks for reading and any opinions would be greatly appreciated.
This is a good discussion. It seems that 12-14 is the age when kids seem to have misgivings about their primary sport, and probably about just about everything in general. More than a few really solid swimmers, such as yours, have left our club team at this age, just seems to happen.
To your questions, would hopping to another team help? Well, that is tough to say for sure but you could probably expect a honeymoon period on another team and then possibly be right back where you are. I like pwb's suggestion to speak to the coach. Any coach who has been around a while should have seen this situation and can hopefully provide guidance. Don't burn your bridges with your current team and don't expect the new team to be nirvana either.
Would it hurt him to swim middle school and not year round? Probably his times would suffer but, at 12 and being a boy, I don't see that as a big issue. Swimming will still be there if/when he wants to return. Just hope if he returns he doesn't end up a bitter and angry manboy like Jazz. There are good clubs out there. Hopefully you will find what you are looking for, or some of what you are looking for anyway. Good luck!
This is a good discussion. It seems that 12-14 is the age when kids seem to have misgivings about their primary sport, and probably about just about everything in general. More than a few really solid swimmers, such as yours, have left our club team at this age, just seems to happen.
To your questions, would hopping to another team help? Well, that is tough to say for sure but you could probably expect a honeymoon period on another team and then possibly be right back where you are. I like pwb's suggestion to speak to the coach. Any coach who has been around a while should have seen this situation and can hopefully provide guidance. Don't burn your bridges with your current team and don't expect the new team to be nirvana either.
Would it hurt him to swim middle school and not year round? Probably his times would suffer but, at 12 and being a boy, I don't see that as a big issue. Swimming will still be there if/when he wants to return. Just hope if he returns he doesn't end up a bitter and angry manboy like Jazz. There are good clubs out there. Hopefully you will find what you are looking for, or some of what you are looking for anyway. Good luck!
