The new Master's coach philosophy is to do lower yardage and more IM. Lots of kicks (strengthen the core), lots of drills, and lots of toys (snorkel, skull finger paddles, regular paddles, zoomers, regular fins, *** stoke fins, finis tempo trainer, light weight kick board...) (disclaimer...I have not bought any of this stuff, just have the normal toys). I am in my 60's, have swum forever, many years in masters, raised age-group kids through college swimming, and am very confused.
I am used to 10 x 100 or 5 x 200's or couple 500's, IM once in a while, option to swim IM or free, kicks as a set in a workout, you know what I'm talkin' bout.
Now I am exhausted doing 90 minutes of kicks and sprints and only going 2000 yards. Flipping at the end of every set, using weight balls in the water, doing 6 x 100 *** stroke kick no hands, doing tandem training, example: swimming arm in arm with the other 60 year old doing fly kicks then holding his legs while I kick and he strokes, then vise versa. Now it is not always exhausting, but it seems always to be frustrating.
Working hard is not the problem, but working hard doing fly kicks in 50 meter pools is frustrating. And my distance flog is suffering. Not just 4 x 50 fly kicks, but 10 x 50 fly kicks.
It has been 4 months with new coach. Others say that they workouts are making them stronger for races and allowing them to be tougher. I worry about hurting my back, my shoulders, and not getting in my yardage.
Fitness swimming should be challenging and fun; I am a wimp? Should I give it more time? I like my team!
I really love how this has become a great discussion with many viewpoints on the dynamics of some coaches and teams out there. I suppose like anything you invest in, you have to figure out what fits for you, your goals, and your personality types.
Our team has a good core group who have been together for a long time. This new coach has been a big change and a good portion of the core group has stayed around despite the turmoil we've been through over the last year (how the previous coach left and more - not getting into that). In some ways, he's been a breath of fresh air and he's trying. Several of our swimmers have been seeing improvements in their times. As I read through the comments here, I appreciate all the feedback and insight. It does give HH and I some perspective.
Coach and I have a pretty good relationship since I'm on the board and help him out with some stuff regularly. He did ask me this morning as we were stretching to get in, if I was working out more than the 1-2 times/week he's seeing me. I told him I was doing a lot on my own at another pool to work on the distance and more free work. It must have got him thinking a bit because afterwards, he offered to tweak things a bit on the IM days to help with my goals. I really appreciated that and need to get more time with him to chat through some other things that I'm hearing with some of the folks on the Team.
He's a good guy, but it really is a drastic change. Neither HH nor I are whining (despite what Aquageek thinks), but both looking for thoughts/ideas (and maybe a little commiseration) since our only other Master's coaching experience was so vastly different. Thank you all!
I really love how this has become a great discussion with many viewpoints on the dynamics of some coaches and teams out there. I suppose like anything you invest in, you have to figure out what fits for you, your goals, and your personality types.
Our team has a good core group who have been together for a long time. This new coach has been a big change and a good portion of the core group has stayed around despite the turmoil we've been through over the last year (how the previous coach left and more - not getting into that). In some ways, he's been a breath of fresh air and he's trying. Several of our swimmers have been seeing improvements in their times. As I read through the comments here, I appreciate all the feedback and insight. It does give HH and I some perspective.
Coach and I have a pretty good relationship since I'm on the board and help him out with some stuff regularly. He did ask me this morning as we were stretching to get in, if I was working out more than the 1-2 times/week he's seeing me. I told him I was doing a lot on my own at another pool to work on the distance and more free work. It must have got him thinking a bit because afterwards, he offered to tweak things a bit on the IM days to help with my goals. I really appreciated that and need to get more time with him to chat through some other things that I'm hearing with some of the folks on the Team.
He's a good guy, but it really is a drastic change. Neither HH nor I are whining (despite what Aquageek thinks), but both looking for thoughts/ideas (and maybe a little commiseration) since our only other Master's coaching experience was so vastly different. Thank you all!
