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Meets the Rest of the Way
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Given some changes, I thought it might be good to review and clarify what we have left for meets this season. Given the Olympic Year, you will see the short-course and long-course seasons blurred; we start swimming some long-course competitions during the short-course seasons, which traditionally wouldn’t start until April. This shift in philosophy was started when USA Swimming established the Short-Course Nationals in December. Some meet schedules have changed, including ours, somewhat slowly in reaction. The whole coaching staff truly appreciates everyone’s support and understanding.
January 19-21 Larson Allen Invitational/@ MAC
Meet added to our schedule when we had to cancel the Eastern Classic Meet. The qualifiers are listed on the website. This is our most competitive meet of the season, and a chance to compete as a Team to win. We travel as a Team to this meet, with charter bus and chaperones. Team competing will be MAC, Nova of Virginia, Marlins of Raleigh, and Daytona Beach. Prelims are short-course, Finals long-course.
January 18-20 Coaches Invitational Stingrays Meet @ Mountain View Aquatic Center
We will take 200 swimmers to this meet that is local and very competitive. It is open to all the Age Group and Senior swimmers not going to the MAC Meet.
February 1-2 Auburn Ralph Crocker Invitational/Auburn University
Another very competitive meet in the Southeast that will feature a wide array of Teams. Open to AG1, AG2, AG3 and AGD swimmers who wish to attend. Athletes travel on their own, and coaches will be at the meet. We have a block of rooms at the Best Western University Center. Families can reserve their own rooms by January 18th. This a timed finals meet.
February 9 Dynamo Stars and Stripes Dual Meet
Open to Dynamo Green and Gold swimmers, we will split the entrants into two teams, the Stars and the Stripes. Each team will compete against each other to win the meet. A great chance for our youngest swimmers to compete. Each team will have their own caps designed for them, and ribbons awarded.
February 7-9 Georgia High School State Championships
Dynamo athletes will compete representing their High Schools at Westminster. Dynamo coaches get the athletes ready to compete well, without compromising the end of the season. This is these athletes big competition for February.
February 10 Time Trial Meet at Dynamo/Chamblee
This meet was added from discussions at our LSC meetings in the Fall. Open to Senior Swimmers, this meet is the day after the HS State Meet allows those swimmers to compete in events they did not swim at the HS State Meet. This meet can be entered ahead of time, or athletes can register the day of the meet.
February 16-17 Dual Meet with ABSC
We swim a meet against ABSC, on Saturday at Dynamo, and Sunday at the University of Georgia. A great opportunity to not only swims some ‘new’ or ‘off’ events, but also a chance to compete in the University of Georgia Natatorium. Open to all Dynamo Swimmers.
February 29-March 3 Georgia Swimming 14&Under Championships
The Age Group Championship for all qualifiers (q-times) The meet is once again in Savannah, and we have a block of rooms that families can reserve. We compete to win as a Team!
March 6-9 Senior Sectionals/Nashville, TN
Team travel meet for qualifiers, this years’ sectionals will be swum Long Course during the Olympic Year. An itinerary and meet sheet will be sent out by February 15th. For many, this will be the end of season shave meet, with a chance to qualify for the Junior and Senior Nationals, as well as Olympic Trials.
March 13-16 Southern Zone Age Group Sectionals/Huntersville NC
Qualifying Age Groupers get to compete against teams from the southeast. Athletes travel on their own with their family. Think of it as a tougher edition of the AG State Meet.
March 14-16 Metro Divisional Championships/Mountain View Aquatic Center
Team Championship Meet for those swimmers who qualify (times forthcoming with meet information). There is a ‘slower than’ time as well for some events, in some age groups. This is a great way to end the season with a large number of Dynamo athletes. 10 and unders have their own Metro Meet later in March.
March 29 Metro Divisional 10 and Under Meet/Mountain View Aquatic Center
The 10 and under qualifiers for the Metro Meet (times forthcoming with meet information) are split out from the meet two weeks earlier, and the meet us cut down to a one day format.
April 3-6 Columbus/Stanford Grand Prix Meet
Our qualifiers take a trip to a USA Swimming Grand Prix Meet, looking for second swims and Olympic Trials Cuts against national level talent.
There comes a time in every season when each swimmer realizes that I have to put in more effort or act in a more disciplined way at practice to realize my goal times for the end of the season. While this may be expressed in words as “practice is too hard”, our staff would prefer to use the word “challenge.” Part of the coach’s responsibility at practice is to balance the fun of swimming and training with friends and the need to challenge swimmers to extend themselves beyond what they thought they are capable of doing. We do this with planning, care, and address it in a systematic and progressive manor. We do not attempt to drive weaker age group swimmers from the sport, but know, if a talented athlete is not challenged, his/her talent will rust. We balance fun, skill development and long term patience to maximize each swimmer’s development.
How much “challenge” is enough? The answer depends on the age and level of swimmer. In our age group program less than 15% of the available time (on a weekly basis) is set aside for “challenge sets.” We may record and track times on these test sets and coach the children to higher levels of performance as the season develops. For some swimmers with the desire and ability, challenge sets will eventually make up 30 to 40 percent of the available workout time in future groups.
All the facts and figures do not matter to a swimmer who says “It’s too hard.” This is where helpful support from parents can be of great assistance. Parents can remind children that some exercises push children into zones of discomfort with good reason. We do not adapt without some workout overload or stress [some of our swimmers just went through a difficult period of training during the Holiday schedule]. It is a basic principle of training applicable to all ages. It is also a basic principle of life that sometimes things get uncomfortable and we work a little harder to bring about a change.
With the change in coaching from group to group and in coaching styles, the practices are indeed very different. We do far more stroke work early on in a swimmer’s ‘career’ and we will challenge them more as they age. With patience and support we are confident that all the children will adapt and eventually thrive in the challenges we set forth for them; then we will change to a different stimulus. We don’t often hear that kids choose to leave the program because they did not have fun or felt it was too hard. Indeed, in the past the most common complaint has been that we did not give enough work or that we were holding swimmers back. We are comfortable in preparing swimmers for the future rather than a coach’s own and the parent’s own immediate gratification.
At the age group developmental level our primary goals are to teach swimming skills, learn good practice habits, expose the children to life skills, set the aerobic conditioning foundation for senior level swimming, introduce competition opportunities, and to have fun. “Fun” is an interesting word. Sometimes there are teaching moments where we can talk about the difference between fun and satisfaction. Many swimmers are still swimming and still loving the sport because the challenge is the fun and the fun is the challenge.
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The Year v. Year Snapshot
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Often at meets I hear conversation about the times swum in races and a lot of talk about how fast “so and so” swam or how slow “you know who” swam at a certain competition. Typically, that is a message or assessment tool that is confusing to the swimmer and coach, and is likely an unhealthy approach to long-term competitive success.
The clearest lens I would encourage you to view your swimmer’s performance through [after their first year of year-round training] is to use the year to year comparison. What did Sally look like in the water, how did she handle this length of a race, how did she handle a meet with a similar competitive environment previously, and what are her times compared to the meet she swam at on a similar date in the previous calendar year? When these two snapshots are compared, how does she stack up in comparison to herself one year ago?
Swimming is a sport that [from a technique development standpoint], will mandate a one-step backward, two-steps forward acceptance if there is to be year to year consistent time drops and four-stroke swimming success, because of physical growth. Physical growth is often the most troubling component to success across a range of strokes and even within the athlete’s currently preferred stroke. A meet is simply a snapshot of how they are managing themselves physically and psychologically in a competitive context or a momentary look at the swimmer’s development in the non-preferred or preferred stroke or distance.
When a parent, child, or coach is consistently comparing the snapshot of the last meet to the snapshot of the current meet, it really makes it challenging to develop skills, manage the stress of competition, and improve racing strategies for the child in such a harsh light. It takes time for the child to receive feedback, apply it in a practice environment consistently, and for everyone to digest real differences and improvement. It has been said that it takes 21 days on doing something differently to develop a new habit…"Psychologists have concluded that it takes 21 days of conscious action to form a desired habit. However, if you miss one day, you will have to begin all over again and go 21 more days before your new habit is formed." Jim Davidson, author of How To Plan Your Life. What if the two snapshots of performance happen two weeks apart?
Further, an environment in which the skills, strategies, and time from each meet are compared to the previous meet is often a harsh and unfair setting for the swimmer’s to grow their love of the sport - this is particularly true for the swimmer transitioning into new age-groups (especially the age-groups where chronologically the kids are the same age, but physically their bodies look as though in some cases there could be a four to six year variation in age). I am particularly sensitive to the swimmer who is transitioning from the 13 to 14 age-group to the 15 and over age realm. They have the psychological obstacle of going to meets [particularly during long course season] where you could be a young looking 15-year old competing against someone who looks 30 years old (or is 30 years old!)
In summary, the next time you see your child swim, I would encourage you to evaluate the pictures rather than the numbers. It is natural to want to know how well your child is doing and to account for his / her progress. However, aren’t we looking for the smile and the snapshot that the numbers can’t express?
Happy Olympic Year – 2008! This is the year that your swimmer will be asked many times if they are training for the Olympics – or do they hope to make the Olympics someday. Every day in practice, every tenth of a second personal best time, every dream of being the best will be highlighted this year. Our parental contributions to this dream will continue to be encouragement, financial support, encouragement, transportation, encouragement, and love. While the world may be focused on China this summer – our future Olympians will be working here to become the best in their group, best in their lane or simply better than they were last week. Michael and Natalie will be household names – and we will watch the Games knowing that there is a connection between them and us. I saw some pictures of the “cubes” being filled in Beijing – it is not really a stretch to see the connection between those “cubes” and our Alpharetta and Chamblee “cubes”. Future Olympians are out there – but more importantly so are their parents. Thanks for keeping our “cubes” filled.
See you around the cubes in 2008!
Kathy Stephens
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New Dynamo Program
Dynamo juniors
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As of January 7, Dynamo has absorbed a program that was running out of Mercer College, near Chamblee. The Dynamo Juniors, as they are now known, is similar to our ‘skills clinic’ that we ran last short-course season. The emphasis is on stroke drills and technique, and it runs in 6-8 week sessions to accommodate those athletes whose primary sport is one other than swimming. Our goal is to allow kids to fall in love with swimming, and attract and support summer swimmers and summer programs.
The program currently is full, and has a waiting list. We decided to honor the programs previous structure through March of this year, and then see how to better integrate it into both the Team and the Lessons Program. This program is recreational, and does not compete in meets other than some time trials during the sessions.
Please welcome the coach of the program, Amanda Tarpley to Dynamo when you see her on deck at Chamblee.
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