Race Club Article

Paul when I swam community college years ago, sprinting was important because the women choose the 50's and 100's of the strokes instead of the 200's. So, I agree even in 4 year college its important for points in the relays.

Well, I'm 48 and the in our Magazine it explains goggles didn't become common place until 1972. If you swam from about 1968 to 1972, the yardage was usually lower than today. I didn't go to a team that swam at least 4,000 yards in a practice until I was 14 years old. Most of the early swimming was on teams that practice between 1,500 to 3,000 yards.

I think there are a lot of Rowdy Gaines. Males mature about 3 years after most females in swimming. Most guys make big time drops in their late teens compared to women. But they have been a few late women starters such as Kristy Koval and Rachel Kamsecz(sorry for the misspelling). And Rachel once did 500 yard free and 200 Fly and started swimming competely which is an old age for a girl at 14 years old.

Originally posted by SCAQ Member If you look at the masters results for swimmers brought up in the 70's versus swimmers brought through the ranks in the 80's, I am more impressed with the 40-49 age group than I am with the 30-39 I wonder if that is a numbers game. When you are in your 30's your kids are more apt to be young, and not as much time to train and compete. When you are in your 40's, you may have more time. I started swimming when my youngest was old enough for team. They had open swimming at the same time and it beat sitting around and waiting.

Originally posted by cinc310 I think there are a lot of Rowdy Gaines. Males mature about 3 years after most females in swimming. Most guys make big time drops in their late teens compared to women. But they have been a few late women starters such as Kristy Koval and Rachel Kamsecz(sorry for the misspelling). And Rachel once did 500 yard free and 200 Fly and started swimming competely which is an old age for a girl at 14 years old. Agree, as I watch my son who quit last year at 16 still grow and grow and grow and he will be 18 in March. I wonder if a girl is fit from another sport and switches to swimming after puberty if that helps. I am watching my daughter struggle to deal with a whole new body this year and have watched other girls do the same in the past. If you start after you have that body, there is not an adjustment. Still I think it must take a tremendous athlete to do well that late.

If you look at the masters results for swimmers brought up in the 70's versus swimmers brought through the ranks in the 80's, I am more impressed with the 40-49 age group than I am with the 30-39

Originally posted in the article THE GET OUT SWIM RULES!: We are all familiar with the get out swim. The get out swim usually happens towards the end of practice on a day when the coach is feeling particularly good or generous or if he needs to get to an appointment. I believe that the get out swim is one of the best things a coach can do. Why? It takes one swimmer out of practice. They are assigned a time by the coach. If they reach that time practice is over and everyone gets out. We swam get out swims also and they were great for mimicking meet pressure and excitement. We also had another novel set. Our Coach ( Greg Troy ) used to have "Stay In Swims" where if you made the set ( which kept getting harder or faster ) you got to stay in and continue swimming. You would feel guilty if you loafed to get out of practice. Although the article was more geared toward tapers, this "Stay In Swims" was geared during the height of training.

Paul, You bring up an important point that many people overlook. The majority of the events including relays that are swum at NCAAs.... and at US Nationals are 200 and below...... not 200 and above. Where are the points scored.... mostly in the sprints. The 200 on the other hand is hard to fake without base training throughout your career, particularly 200 meters. What's worse.... overtraining 50 and 100 freestylers to make a 200, or undertraining (sprinting) your 500 freestylers to survive the first half of a 200 ? John Smith

"So...do we structure our team to find and groom this one kid, or do we give the rest of the team...I'm not sure what I would call it, but a better, more relevant experience given their athletic talent and prospects?" I disagree. Isn't the goal of the coach to help each and every one of his swimmers achieve their full potential, whatever that may be? How is that irrelevant? A coach once told me, "Don't limit yourself." Are you proposing that we train the less talented kids...less? "...many of the kids and the parents are in swimming 'cause they have bought the Olympic dream as a motivation. Given our once in four years coverage, it is what we have to offer to justify why they should spend all that time, money, blood, sweat and tears." Again I disagree. I knew I wouldn't make an Olympic team, but I was thrilled to make my college team as a walk on. To me, that was a pretty big "reward." The great thing about swimming is that it teaches self-motivation and goal setting. "...because swim meets are so darn predictable." What is so "predictable" about swimming a great race and a personal best? Friday night my 14 year old daughter dropped six seconds in the 200 IM, losing by just a second to a girl who at one time could lap her in the same event.

There are a lot of good points here. I think we all (including Gary) are suffering a bit from Olympic Games myopia. To illustrate, let me ask a few questions. How many age groupers are going to the Olympics? Darn few. Indeed, how many are going to college on a swimming scholarship? Only marginally a few more as a percentage of a typical program. So, why are the rest of the people on the team? I would submit that if your answer to that question is something like, "we don't know who the future Olympians will be, so we need to train as many swimmers as possible, and besides we need more people to pay club dues and swim on the relays with our future Michaels and Amandas," your priorities will be different (not better or worse, just different) than the parent of a child who just wants his/her child to get a little exercise, have a little fun, and experience some competition. Here's the trap. We all know very few swimmers will ever be World Class. However, with the rare Rowdy Gains/Ed Moses exception, that one in a million kid will probably need to swim the 10K a day at age 12 to have a shot. So...do we structure our team to find and groom this one kid, or do we give the rest of the team...I'm not sure what I would call it, but a better, more relevant experience given their athletic talent and prospects? How many Pee Wee football coaches say to themselves, "I'm gonna train the next Peyton Manning, and that kid will need an arm like a rifle, so all my kids are going to hit the weight room..."? I have heard even ex-NFL players talk about how crazy that kind of thinking is for grade school kids. So, at one level, the answer of what you do for you swim team seems obvious in a politically correct way. However, there are other factors that make it less obvious. First, many of the kids and the parents are in swimming 'cause they have bought the Olympic dream as a motivation. Given our once in four years coverage, it is what we have to offer to justify why they should spend all that time, money, blood, sweat and tears. Take that away, tell a 10 year old the honest truth, that he will work his tail off for 8-12 years to become...the second runner up of East Pennsyltucky, and Pony League baseball starts to look pretty good. Second, coaches get their credibility training champions. Very few swimmers have a shot at the big Os, but the few that have a shot at having a shot are going to go to the "elite" program in the area. And, every coach wants to coach the elite program. What am I saying? A couple of things. One, swimming needs to make itself more interesting and provide more rewards to every facet below the Olympics. Meets needs to be shorter, more interesting, and the winner needs to be a lot less predictable. We in the U.S. take pride in being the best swimming nation since Johny Weismuller cracked the 1 minute barrier. People, that kind of thing is killing us. I'm sure you can all think of local dynasties where your team is not the annointed champions, say Kenyon in Div III swimming. This perpetuates itself, because swim meets are so darn predictable, because the superstars on their worst day can still kick the tails of 95% of the rest of field recording a personal best, so the program that wins a few in a row will get most of the talent in the future and rarely be challenged, and we swim hours of heats when everyone can fill in the final results with 90% accuracy. We need a professional circuit so that more than a handful of swimmers can make a living, and they don't have to wait four years for their break, and be photogenic or controversial, and have some kind of personal interest angle to even have a shot. Second, there needs to be space in competitive swimming for teams that are about introducing the sport, focusing on their athletes where they are right now, and structured for the median swimmer, not the superstar. I don't know exactly how you do that, but parents and swimmers need to look beyond the champions on a coach's resume. So, to circle back to Gary's Article, I agree with a lot of what he says. One size workout does not fit all swimmers, and kids should try different things and different sports. However, I don't think the critical issue is sprinter vs. distance; it's Olympian vs. everyone else in the sport. We are only just now starting to have a discussion about whether that is the case. Matt