Going in Reverse

Special “Thanks” to the Salmi Girls for “Don’t Give Up, Don’t Give In”- lessons from an extraordinary life by Louis Zamperini & David Rensin.

This is a must read for all athletes and coaches…fabulous short chapters with pearls of wisdom about life, moving forward and dealing with disappointment.

We really liked this one; My Survival Kit.

“Being stuck on a raft in the middle of the Pacific is a pretty exotic circumstance, so let me bring the lesson closer to home. I remember teaching my son, Luke, to drive. He said that it was more like a course in anticipating what every other driver might do. He was right. I also made him learn how to go in reverse before I’d let him put the car in drive. What on earth for? If you can master keeping the car on a straight line going backward, going forward is much easier.”

Sounds simple, right? Try it sometime. Then figure out an example in the world of sports; try that sometime. Hint: ever been injured? – Or disappointed? – Or frustrated? – Or go to your “big meet” and miss?

Solitaire

There is a reason Ken is Head Coach of North Bay Aquatics…mind sharp as a tack. This morning we were driving to a swim meet, talking about a man we know who sometimes isn’t totally present. Ken said, “He’s one card short of a full deck.” And then this, “If you’re going to be short one card it better not be a 3 or you will never win a game of Solitaire.” – Brilliant.

Be short a King or Queen and you can nearly win; be short a 3 and you will never get close.

If a swimmer cannot/will not kick – that’s a 3.

If a swimmer cannot/will not dolphin kick – that’s maybe a 6.

If a swimmer cannot/will not hold her breath on a 50 – that’s maybe an 8.

If a swimmer cannot/ will not deal with pushing to the enth degree of discomfort, 10.

If a swimmer cannot/will not dive correctly – that’s maybe a Jack.

You get the idea. If you want to play a real game of cards you need to have all 52 cards available to you. And you might be saying, “Well there are only really 13 cards.” My response to that is, “There are 4 suits. That makes 52.”

Have a great week and do something this week you have never done before…maybe something you have never even attempted before because you didn’t possess the needed card.

Work Works

We are finishing up a three week “winter training camp” here at North Bay Aquatics – last day is this Thursday January 15th. We began on December 26^th and swam 2 x day every day except January 1^st. Most of the team was back in school on the 7^th. This gave us 22 water sessions in 12 days. We also did our BridgeAthletic strength and conditioning workouts every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Out of 32 swimmers we had 8 who made every session. Another 15 made most of them. Four we never saw. We are now back to one water workout per day since school is in session. We made a poster of the emphasis and a copy of it is below. We hung this on the fence at the pool for viewing twice a day (36” x 48” - cost $140 at Kinko’s – worth every penny!).

Basically what happened is that everyone who participated, even those who did so at less than full attendance, are now in better shape than they were in November. They are swimming faster in workouts and are kicking MUCH faster. Our kick sets range from 1600 to 2000 yards and the work is impressive.

It doesn’t really matter what interval your group can do. Simply start where they are and then keep shrinking the send offs by 5 seconds per hundred and watch them improve. A side bonus to kicking is that it improves cardio fitness, doesn’t beat up their shoulders and ultimately makes them faster.

Here are two sets we have used:

Set # 1 – 8x200 kick with board on whatever interval you can do, just hang on and make the sendoff – 2:50/3:00/3:15 etc. We stole (um, borrowed) from NBAC’s 8x200/2:45 – we have 2 guys who can do this today.

Set # 2 – 8x200/3 - #1 kick the 1^st 50 with a board as fast as you can, then swim easy for 150

#2 kick the 2^nd 50 with a board fast as you can, swim the 1^st 50 and the 3^rd and 4^th easy

#3 kick the 3^rd 50 as above, #4 kick the 4^th 50 as above

#5 kick the 1^st 100 fast as you can and cruise the 2^nd 100 swimming

#6 cruise the 1^st 100 swimming and kick the 2^nd 100 fast as you can

#7 swim a cruise recovery 200

#8 kick a 200 fast as you can…we have done this set 3 times in a little over 2 weeks and now have a ton of kids under 3 minutes, some under 2:50, our fastest is 2:11 – these are all high school age kids.

The second half of the set is the same as above but it is all swimming on 3 minutes with the legs full throttle while swimming on the portions described with the kick board. The focus is on the last one where they are aiming to swim AND KICK a full 200. We don’t care if they fail. We ask them to go for it and see how far into the 200 they can go before the piano lands on them. We are working to get all the way to the wall by March without the piano.

Ultimately work does work. We tell our swimmers if they don’t like pain take up checkers…not chess which requires brain power…

NORTH BAY AQUATICS – HOME OF THE ANGRY TUNA

WINTER TRAINING CAMP 2014:2015

BE EARLY

NO WHINING, COMPLAINING, EXCUSES

SUPPORT YOUR TEAMMATES WITH YOUR EFFORT

GOALS & OBJECTIVES

UNDERWATERS & BREAKOUTS

BREATHING IN 100’S AND AT END OF ALL FREESTYLE RACES

STROKE COUNTS IN BREASTSTROKE AND BUTTERFLY

TEMPO ON ALL STROKES

KICKING

PARACHUTES

BE FITTER, FASTER, STRONGER

TECHNIQUE – ALL THE TIME

PURPOSEFUL TRAINING

ALWAYS BE READY

KEEP YOUR MIND CLEAR – EMPTY THE CLUTTER

HAVE INTENTION

3 X 3 = 9 x 4 = 36 = 1 = Some Measurable Time

Ken is often the brilliant one; I – Don – am often the verbose one…we all have a role to play…

Ken says that if a swimmer could go 3 inches farther on her 3 dolphin kicks off the start and each wall in the same amount of time (highlighted for the obvious reasons) then the ultimate result would be 1 less yard of swimming in a 100 event…another way to view this would be to ask the swimmer to imagine the touch pad was at the 24 yard mark on the last lap…or the 23 yard mark on the last lap of a 200 event.

Then ask the swimmer what his time would be if that were the case. End of story…

(Swimmers need specific targets to aim for and this is a classically wonderful way for them to “learn” about the power of the underwater dolphin kick. Yes this applies to breaststroke as well since all swimmers now can do one dolphin kick with their hands in a streamlined position…thanks to FINA for that one).