I am always amused at how often master's swimmers will take individual liberties in workout to suit their own needs. For example:
* Swimming free instead of breaststroke or the stroke prescribed by the coach.
* One handed turns on *** and fly.
* Cutting corners to stay up with the lane
* Using pull gear when it isn't a pull set
* Kicking your favorite kick and not the one given by the coach
* Leaving 2 seconds behind (more like 2 tenths behind)
* Pulling on the lane line
* Swimming when it's a kick set
* etc...
Maybe its all those years of swimming under "do it my way or the highway" type coaches, that I still have a hard time changing anything in the workout. I must admit however that it does feel good once and while to cheat a little.
As a coach, I've asked many swimmers as to why they change the set or cheat and I hear a million different excuses. I'm very interested in hearing from all of you, all the excuses you have or have heard from other swimmers.
Some of my favorite ones are:
* I don't want to get passed!!!
* I hate the other strokes? (from a former IM'r)
* My tri coach say's I shouldn't swim other strokes
Parents
Former Member
Originally posted by aquageek
However, if you can't do the workout on the board, why are you even swimming with a team?
Ouch. I guess that helps me decide whether or not to renew for next year. :(
I do think this is something Masters should decide and set as a policy, rather than encourage less experienced swimmers (like me) to join and then just be irritated with us throughout the practice. When I picked up a brochure, it said you had to be able to swim 600 free -- it didn't say you had to be able to complete a 3,600 workout of stroke sets. I was totally honest with the coach about my ability level before I went to the first practice (and, of course, she could see me swim in the first workout). If you only want swimmers who can complete the workouts as prescribed, it would be much kinder to just state that up front.
Out of curiousity, what about older swimmers? I watched a meet this past weekend which had an 80-year-old guy competing in several events, very cool. However, I doubt he could keep up with the workout intervals without modifications.
Originally posted by aquageek
However, if you can't do the workout on the board, why are you even swimming with a team?
Ouch. I guess that helps me decide whether or not to renew for next year. :(
I do think this is something Masters should decide and set as a policy, rather than encourage less experienced swimmers (like me) to join and then just be irritated with us throughout the practice. When I picked up a brochure, it said you had to be able to swim 600 free -- it didn't say you had to be able to complete a 3,600 workout of stroke sets. I was totally honest with the coach about my ability level before I went to the first practice (and, of course, she could see me swim in the first workout). If you only want swimmers who can complete the workouts as prescribed, it would be much kinder to just state that up front.
Out of curiousity, what about older swimmers? I watched a meet this past weekend which had an 80-year-old guy competing in several events, very cool. However, I doubt he could keep up with the workout intervals without modifications.
