Is Swimming Eating Its Young?

Is swimming "eating its young?" Are they being burned out with mindless yardage? Do they have to do volume training for long events? Are we missing masters swimmers who were burned out as youths? As to the kids, what can we do to stop the cannabalism? Oh my! Depends on the program and club/ coach mentality. I feel there are some clubs out there who "get it." I got burnt out bad by 18. Dropped it for 12 years and have now been back with it for 5 years - hopefully to stay. As an age grouper I was not even at the highest level offered. A lot of my friends that were at the highest level did sets like 5000 fly for time (I am not kidding) and doing doubles at 13 years old. They had success for a short time, and they now tell me about their (multiple) shoulder surgeries as adults. This was in the eighties. I think that had I swam college, I would not be swimming masters now - I'd be either mentally burned out or physically "roached." I believe Auburn trains their kids around 20K a day at times. Holy cow! One of their top swimmers graduated and moved to another program that does lots less yardage (5K a day) - and actually dropped time across the board in all his events. It's funny how you carry your training habits with you as an adult. I was so used to doing 8000 yds a day, 6 days a week, that any practice now that's under 5000 seems like a warm up. I'm trying to get used to less yardage so that I can ENJOY THIS SPORT MORE!:frustrated: I'm very impressed with SwimAtlanta's mentality with their age groupers - no doubles (at least during the school year.) This is regardless of age or level. And they still continue to turn out top swimmers.

Is swimming "eating its young?" Are they being burned out with mindless yardage? Do they have to do volume training for long events? Are we missing masters swimmers who were burned out as youths? As to the kids, what can we do to stop the cannabalism? Oh my! Depends on the program and club/ coach mentality. I feel there are some clubs out there who "get it." I got burnt out bad by 18. Dropped it for 12 years and have now been back with it for 5 years - hopefully to stay. As an age grouper I was not even at the highest level offered. A lot of my friends that were at the highest level did sets like 5000 fly for time (I am not kidding) and doing doubles at 13 years old. They had success for a short time, and they now tell me about their (multiple) shoulder surgeries as adults. This was in the eighties. I think that had I swam college, I would not be swimming masters now - I'd be either mentally burned out or physically "roached." I believe Auburn trains their kids around 20K a day at times. Holy cow! One of their top swimmers graduated and moved to another program that does lots less yardage (5K a day) - and actually dropped time across the board in all his events. It's funny how you carry your training habits with you as an adult. I was so used to doing 8000 yds a day, 6 days a week, that any practice now that's under 5000 seems like a warm up. I'm trying to get used to less yardage so that I can ENJOY THIS SPORT MORE!:frustrated: I'm very impressed with SwimAtlanta's mentality with their age groupers - no doubles (at least during the school year.) This is regardless of age or level. And they still continue to turn out top swimmers.