Setting goals
Our goals should serve as motivation and inspiration for us. Set the wrong ones and they will either be too easy to achieve or too hard and actually act to de-motivate rather than to drive us forward.
Triathletes: A special breed of swimmer
It is not unusual for a strong runner and cyclist to be a relatively poor swimmer. Often they are looking for a “quick fix” to their problems.
Muscle memory: myth or mastery?
It is vital to remember that muscle memory is a two-edged sword. It can help you become very good at something but equally can train you to be absolutely terrible at something.
Summoning The Genie of Fluidity
If you concentrate too hard on achieving the seemingly impossible, it will remain just that; impossible
Are you having a Dry January? Not likely!
If you want to achieve something or improve something, you don't need to wait until a particular day to start working towards it. Just go for it!
Oi you! Why don’t you push off? I mean, properly push off?
If you’re not practising your push-offs your training is only ever targeted on 80% of the length. For one-fifth of the time you’re mentally and often physically, just drifting.
Can a frog on a bicycle help you swim better?
In order for a cue to be effective, it must be clear, achievable and measurable. If it isn’t, the effects on the stroke will be at best negligible and at worst detrimental.
Ready, steady, wait. (Are you sure you're ready ?)
One ignores a proper warm-up at your peril, particularly with advancing years. It will go a long way to prevent injuries, improve performance, reduce the level of muscle tension and increase the range of motion possible
Time to get in line
The fundamental point of efficient swimming is to displace as little of the water as possible as you move through it and past it. And the position in which you are doing that at the maximum is during Streamline.
Short and sweet
When learning a new movement pattern the average attention span is surprisingly short and it is important to stop before the processing power of the brain has been exhausted
Practice really does make perfect
The student must spend time away from the lessons practising by themselves. This is when the magic happens!
How Are You Feeling?
Your swim coach may well get you to perform a drill and then ask you how it felt. And although that sounds like a simple question it's one that many of us are simply not used to answering with any level of detail.
Don't worry, swim happy
Factors such as time and strokes per length are so ingrained into our coaching and training that it is easy to think that they are the be-all and end-all when it comes to measuring performance
Don't pay attention to your hands. But know exactly what they are doing !
Turning off muscles is often more difficult than engaging them. Go to any public pool and you will see hands doing all sorts of weird and wonderful things...
Location!, location!, location!
Surely the whole point of doing drills is to try and repeat the same actions in the same way, over and over, in order to imprint them into ‘muscle memory’, isn’t it? Yes, it is. And this is why you should try changing something else about the drill.
Encourage Self-Guided Practice
By leading them through this principle-based practice, you are giving them an example of how to practice on their own. You know the principles involved, and over time, you have the opportunity to impart an understanding of those practice principles to your student so that they become a better self-guiding practitioner.