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.
Fun to hear how we got to a place that we love!!!!!
It always came from within me. My earliest memories are of 'swimming' in my blow-up 1-ring 'pool' in front of my house in Arizona. My dad was in the service and we moved to NY when I was six. The air base had a nice pool, and I spent as much time as I could there, just playing in the water (swimming, but not any 'real' stroke). At 11 we moved back to CA (originally from CA), my parents bought their first house and the neighborhood had a swim club with a summer league team. It was just assumed that my brother and I would join as we loved the water so much. The first two years swimming during the summer, we went to practice, competed in meets and had fun. Never worried about what place we came in, because it was fun and we were slow :laugh2: . The summer I was 13, however, something changed and I was one of the top swimmers in my age group, almost always a 1st place. My high school in California was fortunate enough to have a pool on campus and I swam two years of highschool swimming there and the summer I turned 16 I had the league record for 100 Breaststroke. We moved to New Mexico (during December) the year I was 16 and I missed my Junior year of swimming because CA swimming was in the Spring and NM swimming was in the Fall. I made state for the 100 *** stroke my Senior year in NM and swim on a summer league as well. Since then, I have just swum for fun whenever I could get in a pool (I have always traveled with a suit just in case the motel had a pool :) ). Since I have been in TX, either there was no pool nearby or the hours did not mesh with my work hours. However, this past fall a new indoor pool was completed six miles from my house. I began working out again this October and my first meet was in November. It was scary, but I was very pleased with my performance, and I am looking forward to future meets! My coach is helping me refine my free and *** strokes and helping me work on my back and fly. I have to swim at 5:30 am. but as much as I hate getting up early, I love to swim more:applaud: .
Fun to hear how we got to a place that we love!!!!!
It always came from within me. My earliest memories are of 'swimming' in my blow-up 1-ring 'pool' in front of my house in Arizona. My dad was in the service and we moved to NY when I was six. The air base had a nice pool, and I spent as much time as I could there, just playing in the water (swimming, but not any 'real' stroke). At 11 we moved back to CA (originally from CA), my parents bought their first house and the neighborhood had a swim club with a summer league team. It was just assumed that my brother and I would join as we loved the water so much. The first two years swimming during the summer, we went to practice, competed in meets and had fun. Never worried about what place we came in, because it was fun and we were slow :laugh2: . The summer I was 13, however, something changed and I was one of the top swimmers in my age group, almost always a 1st place. My high school in California was fortunate enough to have a pool on campus and I swam two years of highschool swimming there and the summer I turned 16 I had the league record for 100 Breaststroke. We moved to New Mexico (during December) the year I was 16 and I missed my Junior year of swimming because CA swimming was in the Spring and NM swimming was in the Fall. I made state for the 100 *** stroke my Senior year in NM and swim on a summer league as well. Since then, I have just swum for fun whenever I could get in a pool (I have always traveled with a suit just in case the motel had a pool :) ). Since I have been in TX, either there was no pool nearby or the hours did not mesh with my work hours. However, this past fall a new indoor pool was completed six miles from my house. I began working out again this October and my first meet was in November. It was scary, but I was very pleased with my performance, and I am looking forward to future meets! My coach is helping me refine my free and *** strokes and helping me work on my back and fly. I have to swim at 5:30 am. but as much as I hate getting up early, I love to swim more:applaud: .
