Ken was talking to the team (Ken DeMont, Head Coach, North Bay Aquatics) last week about our successes of the last season. It was a great way to begin the fall training block…how we can build off of our recent swims, that sort of thing. Then he led a particularly effect discussion. He asked the team “What if we swam just 1% faster, what would that have done for us?”
He used specific examples of many of our swimmers and some of their fastest swims, ending each example with the specific result of a 1% improvement. Numerous kids would have made finals at Sectionals or Jr. Nationals or gotten their Jr. National or Sr. National cuts or even Olympic Trial’s cuts.
It was a real eye opener for the team…and a stroke of coaching genius by Ken. We only trained 3 days last week, giving everyone the 4 day weekend. Next week will be a 4 day training week and then we get rolling into the normal flow of things.
Each day this week we have posed the 1% question to them, almost in passing sometimes. It is the kind of thing that the ones who have a passion will latch onto for sure. It is also very possible that it will reach some of the others who are deciding (maybe even subconsciously) whether to jump in with both feet and explore the possibilities.
Try this exercise with your team or for yourself…then let us know how it goes. Have a great week at the pool!
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