By David

Whether the long term goal is to win a national title, get a university scholarship in the USA or win a major international event, every swimmer is entitled to dream big. The speed at which major goals are realized will vary from swimmer to swimmer but should never be constrained by coach, athlete or parent.

Having said that, an Olympic gold medal at 13 is probably a touch optimistic, although Amanda Beard did get close to even that lofty goal. Toni Jeffs is the fastest improver I have seen. When she came to my squad she was a consolation finalist in the New Zealand open nationals: about 10th in NZ. In just twenty-four weeks, she improved to New Zealand’s 100 and 50 freestyle champion and was placed 5th in the 100 freestyle and 4th in the 4×100 freestyle relay at the Auckland Commonwealth Games. Nichola Chellingworth had a similar stellar rise. She swam a NZ national 12 year old record in only her second ever competitive swimming race. Jane Copland qualified for the New Zealand Open Nationals when she was twelve years old. She made a top eight World Cup final in Hong Kong at 13.

These are unusual examples. But they do highlight the importance of not putting time limits on achieving goals. All three swimmers were encouraged to dream big, a quality that contributed hugely to their early success. A more normal story however is a swimmer I coached in the United States who had swum at a modest level for years when he came to my team. He took a further two years to swim in a USA national championship final. His progress in the first six months was modest indeed and he was a very talented man. Another talented swimmer I coached in Florida swam with me for eighteen months before she began to make progress. She now swims well in the United States National Championships and has a partial athletic scholarship to a good American University.

These examples got me thinking about the factors that influence the speed of a swimmer’s improvement. Talent is a factor but not an important one. Probably the biggest contributing difference between those that took time and the three rapid improvers is the history of their early careers. When the slower improvers came to my program they were damaged goods. Their careers needed to go through a rehabilitation period before they could progress again. For example one of the Florida swimmers was ranked 4th in the USA at twelve and had been exploited for years by a poor coach and an ambitious mother. The three rapid improvers came to my program with no such problems. Toni had been coached by her father who was a very good coach. Probably his only “crime” was not pushing his daughter hard enough. He certainly laid the foundation from which she could progress quickly to international success. The other two had never swum competitively before their early successes.

A second important factor is the emphasis a Lydiard program puts on the mileage swum in the buildup. Swimmers simply cannot expect the best racing results if their training buildup mileage is low. Some programmes try and compensate for lost mileage by increasing the severity of the anaerobic and speed training. That seldom works and is certainly not good for the athlete. For senior squad swimmers to progress to the sort of long term goals mentioned above requires 70 to 100 kilometers a week in the buildup. A characteristic common to the rapid improvers is that all three did many 100 kilometer weeks. The two slower improvers from Florida also swam similar distances. One of them had a best 10 week total of 950 kilometers. Swimmers who average 40 kilometers a week are just not providing themselves with a sufficient base to build a successful career. When Alison Wright was one of the world’s best middle distance runners she ran for a four year period and missed just three training sessions. I know swimmers who miss that number and more every week. Alison’s best ten week mileage was 1200 miles (1920 kilometers). Success is seldom by chance.

And finally take into account how well a swimmer is actually improving. A very good figure produced by the American Swim Coaches Association is their 3% annual rate of improvement target. If swimmers want to be international athletes or achieve one of the long term goals mentioned earlier in this article they should aim for an average improvement of 3% per annum. Duncan Laing told me Danyon Loader averaged 3%. Jane Copland averaged 2.8%. Dream big but keep in mind this American figure. When it comes to swimming they know what they are talking about.

Remember though that not every season will be an improvement over the previous season. When a pause occurs there is no reason for concern. Occasionally swimmers need time to consolidate. Two or three seasons of good progress go by and for no obvious reason there is a season where the swimmer seems to be drawing breath, gathering reserves and getting ready to go again. Certainly the careers of Toni, Nichola and Jane seemed to work that way. Improvement was not a series of neat 3.0% annual steps to national swimming honors. When a pause does occur, be patient. Take the long-term view. Because the method of training is sound, move on and it will come right.

To illustrate the point, set out below is a table showing the percentage annual improvement in competition times for an international swimmer I coached from the age of 12 to 18. The data shows that after two early years of big improvements this swimmer went through a four year period of good improvements and plateaus; a trend quite common in developing swimmers.

So there it is; dream big and urgently but in evaluating your individual circumstances take into account your history; take into account how well you have done in the buildups; take into account how close you are to the 3% per annum rate of improvement. Only then will you have a balanced view of your current progress.

By David

Each week Swimwatch is read in about 35 countries. I imagine readers in most of them will have heard about the 7.1 Richter scale earthquake that recently rocked the New Zealand city of Christchurch. Unbelievably no one was killed, but the Christchurch community was a mess. Dozens of buildings were condemned, water and electricity supplies were spasmodic and events like the New Zealand Short Course Junior Swimming Championships had to be shifted. The Championships were originally scheduled for Christchurch from the 26th to 30th September. With the pool short of water and the pool buildings in need of repair, Swimming New Zealand had no option but to cancel the event or shift it to another location.

Swimming New Zealand handled a difficult problem well. In spite of the limited time available they consulted the swimming community widely and decided to move the Championships to New Zealand’s capital city, Wellington. Our Club has seven swimmers qualified to swim in the Championships but we won’t be going. I’ve never been a great fan of age group nationals. The Americans do well to avoid the national age group events, so popular in New Zealand, Australia and, come to think of it, most of the rest of the world. In my experience the New Zealand version is an awful event.

They are the scene of too much hurt. At the beginning of the week keen, enthusiastic, happy young people arrive full of anticipation, coached and honed to a competitive edge. Parents dash around checking that their charge’s start list seed times have been properly entered and locating the town’s best source of pasta. Coaches patrol the pre-meet practice with all the intensity of an Olympic warm up. International swim meet promoters would die to be able to create the nervous energy present at the beginning of your average New Zealand age group championship.

By the end of the first morning’s heats you can detect the mood beginning to change. The problem is thirty swimmers enter an event, eight make a final, three get medals and one wins. Potentially there are twenty nine disappointed swimmers and fifty eight disappointed parents who can’t wait to get back to the motel for their treble gin and tonic to ease the pain. It’s a disappointment born out of expectations set far too high.

As each day goes by the mood darkens and deepens. The transformation is stunning. The tremendous high of the first morning slumps during the day; is momentarily revived at the beginning of day two, only to slump even further. By day four all I want to do is get the hell out of there and make sure no swimmer of mine ever goes back. For someone whose heart is in seeing athletes soar, the New Zealand Age Group and Junior Championships are not something I care to watch.

There was a good article on the US Junior Nationals in an old issue of the USA Swimming magazine “Splash”. In it USA Swimming demonstrates an acute awareness that their event needs to avoid many of the problems characteristic of the New Zealand version. They say:

“Along the way, however, many coaches and others within USA Swimming saw a disturbing trend. Instead of a whistle stop on the way to Senior National and international competition the Junior Nationals were embedding themselves as a destination.”

The Americans have done some good things to avoid the problems inherent in New Zealand’s Age Group and Junior Championships to ensure their meet is a whistle stop and not a destination. First of all the American event is an “open” junior event; not an age group championship. Everyone up to a relatively old 18 can swim in their Junior Nationals. There are no single year age group categories. The protection of individual age categories used in New Zealand encourages young swimmers to compete in a false reality; promoting the event as a winning destination rather than a stepping stone to senior swimming. The national body here is about to compound that problem by “nationalising” championships for 10, 11 and 12 year old children. The false reality that is characteristic of New Zealand age group swimming will now start even younger. It is almost impossible to imagine any winning 10 year old ever making it past the seven further national age group hurdles to finally emerge as a winning senior international athlete. A quick look through the year 2000 12 years and under “national” results illustrates the point. Not one winner has made it through to the 2010 Pan Pacs team. The best I could see was Lauren Boyle who was 8th equal in the 12 year old girls 100 freestyle.

Secondly, the American junior qualifying standards are really tough. They reflect their “older” cut off age. An athlete has to be quick just to make the cut. There’s a fair chance swimmers that fast will have the experience and maturity to handle the occasion. A young Lauren Boyle would have to wait a few years before she could even compete in the American National Junior Championships. Her 1.07 in 2000 would have had to become 58.59 to even qualify for the American junior event. In Boyle’s case, she was tough enough to make it through the New Zealand system and prosper; a quality she subsequently confirmed by competing successfully in the world’s toughest swimming environment: the NCAAs.

Thirdly, names included on the US junior meet’s list of alumni suggest their “Juniors” are a successful transition between local and international competition. Unlike the New Zealand results “Splash” tells me Gary Hall, Aaron Peirsol, Ian Crocker and Michael Phelps swam here. That’s a pretty impressive list. Their “Junior National Championship” is working all right.

By David

The United States National Swimming Championships have come and gone. Just like the New Zealand version they too have highlighted the good, the bad and the ugly.

Without question, the good was the general standard of swimming. Year after year the US produces a group of swimming super stars. Behind them, in every event there are a dozen others clamoring for their moment in the sun. This year was no exception. Phelps, Lochte, Soni, Volmer, Vanderkaay, Hoff, Coughlin, Beisel and Adrian came, saw, conquered and left. I was particularly pleased to see Lochte swimming so well. I once had a conversation with his father coach at a swim meet in Ft. Lauderdale. He described the huge mileages (90-100 kilometers a week) his son had swum as he worked his way to the top of American swimming. It’s always pleasing when that level of application is rewarded. Beating Phelps and winning the 200 IM in 1.54 was especially memorable. Phelps is the world’s best swimmer. To better him at anything, especially a National 200 IM, is huge. I would imagine Phelps is not best pleased and will be looking at the Pan Pac’s race as an opportunity to put the record straight. It would be wise not to bet against an angry Michael Phelps.

Other Americans who will win at the Pan Pacific Games include Soni in the breaststroke, Lochte in the 400 IM and Coughlin and Peirsol in the 100 backstroke. I was surprised at the versatility demonstrated by Peirsol at this meet. There was nothing unusual about his 53 second placing in the backstroke but his fourth place 52 in the butterfly was more than I expected. Although New Zealand’s National Coaches have told the world it is the Commonwealth Games that are the real 2010 test for New Zealand’s swimmers, it is actually this group of American athletes they should be after. This is where the 2012 Olympic Games are going to be won and lost. All the rest is just political flannel.

Two “old-timers” swam well at the US Nationals; Amanda Beard and Sabir Mohamad. Amanda Beard managed a really impressive 2.26 second place in the 200 breaststroke. She’s 28 years old and has been swimming fast breaststroke since she was 12. A few years ago I watched her compete in a World Cup series. She displayed that deep seated toughness that true champions usually bring to their trade. I imagine the National 200 result will see her on the team for next week’s Pan Pacific Games. What a fantastic story her swimming life has been. Sabir Mohamad is 34 and swam 23.20 in the 50 freestyle. His best event is actually the 50 fly. I remember him swimming in European World Cup events. He was an expert at sending Swedish female spectators wild by standing on the blocks before a race and rolling his mightily impressive abs. He clearly enjoyed the moment as much as they did.

The Swim MAC Club from North Carolina had an unusual disqualification affect one of their swimmers. The disqualification of Josh Schneider from the men’s 50 free and his reinstatement raised some interesting administration issues. Schneider was entered in the 100 fly but did not report for his heat and was disqualified from his next event, the 50 freestyle. According to Craig Lord, who I admit is not the World’s most reliable source; Schneider said “It’s something I’ve never trained for. I didn’t even look in the heat sheet for my name.” If that’s true, for a Club to enter a swimmer as good as Schneider in an event at the US Nationals and not tell him doesn’t demonstrate particularly good management. Swim MAC appealed the disqualification and could win on a technicality. It may be possible for the “no show” penalty to be dismissed at this meet since missing his swimsuit check before the 100 fly would have already resulted in Schneider being disqualified and therefore not required to report for the race..

A second MAC swimmer at these Nationals was coached by me for eighteen months. In that time he swam personal best times for the 50 and 100 freestyle of 23.38 and 50.95. In the year he’s swum at MAC his 50 has improved to 23.11 and the 100 hasn’t improved at all. His best 100 is now 1.1 seconds (2%) slower. Even the 50 is only 1.1% faster; well below the 3% annual improvement expected from potential international swimmers. I recall being told of the wonderful progress expected as a result of the change to Swim MAC. Whatever the reason, it hasn’t worked.

One other swimmer at these Nationals was coached by me about four years ago. She ended up swimming 8.49 in the 800 at this year’s Championship. That’s a good time and was worth a mid-20s place. It is still most of the pool behind Chloe Sutton who won the 800 in 8.24. But, the ex-Florida swimmer may have been faster without the influence of a mother who was responsible for an anonymous poison letter sent to one of our swim team’s sponsors and other disruptive behavior. You may recall her antics were the subject of a post on Swimwatch, written about six months. That can’t be good for anyone’s swimming career. There are some strange folk in the swimming world.

And so the National week is over. The Championships are great entertainment and serve as a valuable teaching tool in a country as far away as New Zealand. The reality of how well the world’s best swimmers do their job is a good lesson for us all.