Luck of the Draw

Monday through Thursday workouts cycle through strokes and disciplines and follow a specific order. Fridays are fun day. Saturdays are my open days. Open days mean that I can do whatever I want without looking at my season plan. The kids love Luck of the Draw. Flip Darr, my coach at Saddleback, had a much more insane version of this. I redesigned it for the younger athletes. So on occasion I will pull out my deck of cards and let luck decide their fate.

What I do is run through a long kick set followed by a simple IM set for the first hour. Then, I have the kids pick a partner. If I want to save time, I just group them by lane. One card gets picked per group. A specific card coincided with a specific set on the Luck of the Draw workout page. Some are hard. Some are easy. And some are just plain fun. Design your own or use this one. Have fun.

Click on image to enlarge.

10 & Unders: To Taper or Not to Taper

It's no secret that 10 and under swimmers don't get the same physiological benefit out of a taper than older, more mature swimmers. And I have heard more than a couple times in the many clinics that I have taken part in that you don't really need to taper the younger kids. But does this mean that they don't get a motivational boost, or perhaps some psychological benefit out of a taper? I have used tapers successfully with my 10 and under athletes for years. The trick is to make them believe! Believe in their team, believe in their coach, and believe in themselves.

THE MEETING

I usually start my taper with the 10 and under Gold group about 5-6 workouts before the big meet. On day one, I begin with a group meeting. Kids enjoy learning and they crave knowledge for the things they love to do. So, I explain to them exactly what I plan on doing, and more importantly, why. I let them know that if they follow my plan that their chances of success are dramatically increased.

NO DRYLAND

I run a very intense dryland program. So, at this point, we stop strengthening the body and focus on strengthening the mind. I am a talker and I like to use the 30 minutes out of the water for motivational talks, games, and discussions. I teach positive thinking all the way.

THE WORKOUT

A typical regular season workout averages a little under 4,000 yards a day with 1 hour and 30 minutes of water time. We stick with our regular routine all season long, alternating strokes and disciplines each day. The kids get used to a routine and appreciate the fact that they can usually figure out what the next set will require. A couple weeks before the taper I will give them some really hard workouts that go a little over 4,000 yards.

So, to begin the taper I break the routine and get them doing something different. I will start with an unusual warm up set followed by a longer freestyle kick set. After about 45 minutes of semi-typical hard work I bring in the racing sets. We will do some broken 100's and 200's for time. Some 25's sprint on 1:00, no breathers, are also common. For the last little bit of extra time, I go over starts, turns, breakouts, etc. I only drop my yardage by about 100-300 yards a day, never dropping below 2,500 yards. Any extra time I get out of dropping yardage goes into more starts, turns, streamlines, and basic racing skills. I do not let my kids out early.

THE HAPPIEST COACH IN THE WORLD

During this time I become the happiest coach in the world. I make a huge effort to build their confidence beyond my normal capabilities. At first it is a bit hard. But after a couple days of making myself see only the positive and working on that alone, it really gets addictive and becomes a very exciting and fun time for myself and the kids. I really try to become the most positive and constructive person that the kids can believe in. No threatening. No yelling. No disappointment on my face EVER.

In conclusion, I feel that it is important to create some sort of big meet atmosphere around the workouts that lead up to the actual big meet. It may not even need to be a real taper. Perhaps you can call it a peek performance week. But something out of the ordinary that will get the kids fired up about swimming fast for the team. Something that will get the kids to believe!

2 lines in 2 seconds

I wanted to get the kids streamlining faster through the flags so I decided to give them a time-limit and a distance. I thought 3 seconds would be a good goal to get to the 3rd black line at the bottom of the pool. GOOD IDEA!....Not really. The first time the Gold group did this was a bit of a disaster and I ended up being the big grump on the pool deck that day. 20x25 on 30 seconds in IM order didn't really allow for the kids to catch their breathe in time to pull off a full 20 repeats of high intensity streamlining. So, lesson learned. Next time, I tried it with my Blue group but brought it down to 2 in 2. It really worked well with the Blue kids this time. They were getting past the flags and faster than normal.

So, if you are looking to get your kids past the flags and want to try something new, add this to your tool box and see what kind of results you get. Time-limit + Distance = Faster streamlining. Just make sure it is a reasonable distance and time and they get enough time to catch their tiny little breaths.

High-Fly Tempo Drill

I like this drill for any style flyer at almost any level. If you want to increase the tempo and get your swimmer undulating quicker, recovering faster, and catching immediately with no hesitation, this is one of the best drills.

First, have your swimmer float out about arms distance from the wall. Have them do vertical butterfly kicking with their arms down at the side for about 5-10 seconds. If you go any longer then they can tire quickly and you won't see the results you are looking for. The vertical kick forces the swimmer to optimize their amplitude and tempo in order to keep their face out of the water. Once you feel that they have the right speed have them grab the wall and quickly go for a lap of high intensity fly. I like to remind them to try to match the speed of their undulation to the speed they were able to achieve in their vertical kicking.

White Water Warm Up

This is a warm up I designed after realizing my kids needed to work on maintaining their kick during breathing and stroke cycles. I noticed many of the swimmers, even the ones that were great kickers with a board, had trouble kicking while they moved their head for the breathe. So, I came up with this set and did it as a warm up for a full week before our next swim meet. I felt that I had good results in the freestyle events so I decided to keep this set handy and pull it out when I needed it.

Short Course on 40 sec.

4x25 Free Kick w/ board

4x25 Free Kick w/ no board - Hands in front

4x25 Catch Up

4x25 Swim

Everything is done with the emphasis on creating white water with their kicking. I try to get them to focus on the speed and size of their kicks from wall to wall. And what I really look for is that they maintain their white water during the breathing cycle. It is easy to kick hard with a board. But take the board away and add in an arm pull and a breathe and it gets much more difficult. This set will help the kids keep that strong kick going from start to finish.

Correcting techniques for age group swim coaches

The following techniques can be used to help your swimmers correct technical problems during the workout.

The set is 6x100 Free on 2:00.  You ask the kids to focus on their streamlines and dolphin kicks off of each wall.  At some point during the set you will notice one or more swimmers poorly executing their streamlines.  First, use the Verbal/Visual technique.  If that doesn't work to your satisfaction and the child is still pushing off the walls with unsatisfactory streamlines, then go to the Tactile approach.  If you are still not getting the desired results on a consistent basis, then add on Tactile Conditioning.   The key is to be patient and assume or imagine that they are brand new swimmers that are learning this skill for the very first time.  

1.  Verbal/Visual:  First, stop the child.  Tell the child what he needs to be doing correctly.  Show the child by making the correct movements yourself.  Then allow him to continue.

-"Hey Chris.  Make sure you are locking your elbows behind your head.  That will keep your streamline tight and ensure you have maximum speed of your walls."

2.  Tactile:  Calmly ask the child to exit the water.  Make sure he doesn't feel like he is getting in trouble.  Use the Verbal/Visual technique and follow it up by making the child repeat the movements themselves.  If he is having trouble making the correct movements then you can carefully help him by guiding his actions.

-"Chris.  Why don't you come out here so we can work on your streamlines.  OK, you see how tight my arms are behind my head?  There is no space between my head and my arms.  Now you show me your streamline.  Good job!"

3.  Tactile Conditioning:  Stop the child.  Ask them nicely to repeat the action correctly.  Do this until they accurately perform the technique.  Also, include the other correction techniques to help if needed.

-"Chris.  Can you do that flip-turn for me again?  This time show me your great streamline and add 5 dolphin kicks.  Excellent."

You can use these techniques for just about any skill that you teach your age group swimmers. Some specific skills may require a little more creativity in order to successfully adapt these correcting techniques to your workout.  Be patient and HAVE FUN!  If you feel yourself getting frustrated at your swimmers for butchering your perfectly planned workout, use these techniques.   

Summer time means tired swimmers

As a coach, I realize that younger kids want to play during the summer, and that often means tired swimmers at swim practice. Today, I had just about half of all my Gold swimmers do something exhausting before swim practice. The fact that it was in the high 80's didn't help much in my pursuit of an excellent dry-land day. Between Junior Lifeguards, pool parties, sleepovers, beach days, surf camps, and just about everything a kid can do with all the time in the world, there hardly seems enough time in the day for a 2 hour dry-land/swim workout. But they come. They come tired, fatigued, and slow. But they still come. I know I may not be able to get 100% out of them, but I make sure to let them know that if they choose to come to any workout, that they are going to give everything they've got. I let the kids know that all those other things are totally cool and OK to do during the summer. I want them to have fun. However, if they show up, they have to work just as hard as the day before. If they are too tired to give everything they've got, then they should have stayed home and made that their day off. After all, they are only required to make a minimum of 4 out of 6 offered workouts per week to be in these groups. Today started slow and the kids were certainly not into the dry-land with the heat, but by the last set they were giving everything they had. And that is absolutely all I expect.