I love the stories about who motivated you to start swimming. They're usually great stories. Let me start by telling you mine.
I was with about 7yrs. old and at a 20yd indoor Grand Rapids West YMCA pool, during a "free swim".
The lifeguard was the YMCA Director named Tom (about 25 or so at the time). I knew how to do the breaststroke pretty good for no formal coaching (my older brother swam competitively). It was a Saturday and there were about twenty screaming kids in the pool until Tom blew his whistle. He yelled at everyone to get out of the water and you could hear a pin drop (someone had to be in trouble). He pointed at me and told me to come over and see him. I thought I would pee right there. I didn't do anything anyway, I told myself, and he shouldn't be yelling at people so loud, I thought. I was thinking of what I might have done in the last few minutes as I walked slowly his way until I gulped and stood silent waiting for him to say something. He said to everyone, "You're a pretty fast swimmer and I want to race you across the pool". I was looking at him as everyone of the kids started hooting and hollering. "Well" he said, "Let's go". He told me that we'd be doing the breaststroke. I wanted to race, I wanted to win, even if he was bigger. When he said go, I raced and he sure looked like he was going as fast as he could, and ---- I won. He looked exhausted after that long 20 yard swim, I know I was really tired but I beat him fair and square. He spent about five minutes explaining that someone as fast as me should be on the YMCA swimming team. I couldn't believe it, he wanted me to join the team, heck, I didn't even know they had a team. Well, I almost hyperventilated as I told my mom and dad that I wanted to be on the swim team because I'm the fastest little swimmer that coach had ever seen. I've been swimming and coaching (I wanted to be a coach like him) ever since.
To this day, that one man changed my life by doing something I try to do as much as possible and that's; find something good someone's doing and, only if it's sincere, lavish as much praise as possible onto that someone. Tom did it for me and I hope I can keep doing it for other people and swimmers, young and old. He was a master at making people feel like a million bucks.
Let's hear your story. Coach T.
Parents
Former Member
As a kid (around 10) I never competed much but we trained weekly with a local swimming baths team in the UK.
My grandmother worked as a cashier there too so many of my summer days were spent in the water. Hence it was my grandparents who got my sister and I involved with the club. I canstill see my old coach standing on deck doing the breaststroke arms as a demonstration.
My sister had better style than me and was soon asked to move up the the Havering "Killerwhales" team (you can look them up on the web) she went a few times to early morning training sessions but soon grew interesetd in other things and dopped out. I tended to follow my sister's lead too and stopped trainin. We were very young though.
In addition to that our primary (elementary) school had it's own pool where the fabulous Mrs Ward taught us to swim, and encourage those more able to pursue swimming. Her daughter was a good swimmer, and she would tell us about her races.
I guess the good news is the foundation work had been done and I could swim reasonably well for a non-training swimmer. Apart from a few school swims (Breaststroke of course) and races I didn't do much as a teen, and I got into other activites and sports up until most recently.
I returned to the water for fitness without impact reasons and soon found myself swimming my first mile (I probably did this in my younger days, but just didn't know it). The other amazing thing I found was how much I enjoyed being in the water again and swimming. It was like finding a lost toy in your parent's attic or something. I came to the forums to find out if I was swimming a mile in decent time, and where to aim timewise.
I got involved in a couple of threads, and started to make some friends here, and have some banter on posts. Reading about what everyone was up to and racing etc began to make me think about competing. When I asked about it all I got was people telling me to just go for it. Now I am worrying about streamlining, my shoddy tuns and what-not.
So it was coming here and encountering a few folks that didn't judge me for not being as accomplished as them that inspired me.
Thanks
Rich
As a kid (around 10) I never competed much but we trained weekly with a local swimming baths team in the UK.
My grandmother worked as a cashier there too so many of my summer days were spent in the water. Hence it was my grandparents who got my sister and I involved with the club. I canstill see my old coach standing on deck doing the breaststroke arms as a demonstration.
My sister had better style than me and was soon asked to move up the the Havering "Killerwhales" team (you can look them up on the web) she went a few times to early morning training sessions but soon grew interesetd in other things and dopped out. I tended to follow my sister's lead too and stopped trainin. We were very young though.
In addition to that our primary (elementary) school had it's own pool where the fabulous Mrs Ward taught us to swim, and encourage those more able to pursue swimming. Her daughter was a good swimmer, and she would tell us about her races.
I guess the good news is the foundation work had been done and I could swim reasonably well for a non-training swimmer. Apart from a few school swims (Breaststroke of course) and races I didn't do much as a teen, and I got into other activites and sports up until most recently.
I returned to the water for fitness without impact reasons and soon found myself swimming my first mile (I probably did this in my younger days, but just didn't know it). The other amazing thing I found was how much I enjoyed being in the water again and swimming. It was like finding a lost toy in your parent's attic or something. I came to the forums to find out if I was swimming a mile in decent time, and where to aim timewise.
I got involved in a couple of threads, and started to make some friends here, and have some banter on posts. Reading about what everyone was up to and racing etc began to make me think about competing. When I asked about it all I got was people telling me to just go for it. Now I am worrying about streamlining, my shoddy tuns and what-not.
So it was coming here and encountering a few folks that didn't judge me for not being as accomplished as them that inspired me.
Thanks
Rich
