American
Vol 2014 Issue 2
Coaching
13-18 Year Olds
For the 400 IM
Coach Michael Brooks
Operating a
World Class
1000 Member
Swim Program
Coach Bill Rose
WISDOM
Compiled By John Leonard
Stimulated By Doug Wharam
Training Camp Sets
American Swimming Coaches Council for Sport Development
5101 NW 21st Ave., Suite 530
Fort Lauderdale, FL 33309
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Don Swartz
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
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American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
ASCA Partners Up With
Bratter/Krieger LLP
ASCA is pleased to announce their
partnership with the Immigration Law
Firm of Bratter Krieger LLP, a full service
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There is
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We look forward to an enduring relationship
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John Leonard, Excutive Director
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
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Features
American Swimming Magazine
6
C oaching 13-18
year olds for the
400 im
Published for the American Swimming Coaches Association by the
American Swimming Coaches Council for Sport Development.
By Michael Brooks
Board of Directors
President: Gregg Troy
Vice-Presidents: Jim Tierney, Steve Morsilli
Members: J ack Bauerle, Don Heidary, Ira Klein, Matthew
Kredich, David Marsh, Tim Murphy, Eddie Reese,
Richard Shoulberg, Bill Wadley, Chuck Warner
Executive Committee: Jennifer Gibson, Tim Welsh
19 wisdom
Compiled by John Leonard
Stimulated by Doug
Wharam
25 training camp sets
By Don Swartz
ASCA Staff
Executive Director and Editor John Leonard
Clinics and Job Services Guy Edson
administrations Atunya Walker
Finance Kim Cavo
Bookkeeping\Sales Lenora Hayes
Membership Services Melanie Wigren
Certification Kim Witherington
Technical Services and WSCA Matt Hooper
Web & Publishing Director: Mary Malka
SwimAmericaTM and ALTST Julie Nitti
General Counsel Richard J. Foster
The Magazine for
Professional Swimming Coaches
A Publication of the American Swimming Coaches Council for Sport
Development, American Swimming Magazine (ISSN: 0747-6000) is published
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© 2014 American Swimming Coaches Association.
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American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
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o perating a world
class 1000 member
swim program
By Coach Bill Rose
STRAPLESS
EVOLUTION
T H E N E W I N S T I N C T S T R A P L E S S S C U L L I N G PA D D L E S
#FINISinstinct
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
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On the
Cover
6
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
Coaching
13-18 Year Olds
For the 400 IM
By Coach Michael Brooks
Introduction: Michael is the head coach at
York YMCA in York, Pennsylvania, been
there for four years and yesterday he
talked to us about his sometimes rocky or
always rocky journey to bringing that club
from nowhere to being a very successful
program. Today he’s going to talk to us
about what I think is one of the most
important events in all of swimming, the
400 IM, and how to develop your athlete
towards that. I know that Michael values
versatility and I’m sure he’ll share with
us how he’s taking advantage of USA
Swimming’s IMX program to motivate his
athletes to move towards swimming the
400 IM. He’s one of the most creative,
thought provoking and – I think he proved
yesterday – adaptable coaches that we
have in our sport. Michael Brooks.
Michael Brooks: Thanks very much,
Mark. First I’d like to of course thank John
Leonard and ASCA for the opportunity
to speak here. It is a pleasure after I get
going. Okay, today I want to talk about the
IM and training age groupers – well, 13- to
18-year-olds, I guess, in particular for the
400 IM. First, a little bit about York and the
IM. We’re definitely a work in progress.
Take what I say with a grain of salt. I
haven’t yet produced a world record holder
or an Olympian. I hope that’s coming in
the next few years but we have had some
pretty good results in the 400 IM.
Over the last couple of seasons we’ve had
three NAG champions. We have had at
least one NAG champion in IMX champion
every year every season and we’ve got lots
and lots of kids in the top 10 in the country
in both IMX and in the 400 IM. We’ve had
two kids make the National Junior Team
in the last few years, both of them in the
400 IM and one of them swam in the World
Junior Games or World Youth Games in
Peru just a couple of weeks ago, also 400
IM. So we are getting some nice things
done and I hope
hope that’s
that’s just
just aa prelude
prelude to
to
done
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
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much nicer in the next few years.
Because I don’t have a PowerPoint, I’ll
give you an overview of the argument
and then I’ll try and stick to my plan pretty
rigorously so that you’ll have an idea of
where we’re going. First, I’m going to talk
about why the IM and then why the 400 in
particular and not the 200 and then in the
400 IM exactly when do you start having
kids race the 400 IM? Next, the challenges
of individual medley training. After that, six
desiderata which basically means things
to be desired, what I want to build kids to
be able to do. Next, a motivation to train
for the IM. I think it does take a special
kind of kid and then last, tactics in the 400
IM both short course and long course. I
think they’re slightly different.
Okay. First, why the IM? I see the 400 IM
champion as the complete swimmer. I like
kids who can do everything and who are
good at everything so IM doesn’t mean
doing everything poorly. I want to make
sure they’re very solid across the board and
when they’re older then they can decide
that they’re 50 freestylers or milers or 200
butterflyers but essentially everybody in the
program is a 400 IMer until they’re 15, 16,
17 years old. You don’t know what their
best stroke is going to when they’re older.
I’ll let the college coaches try and figure
that out and I think one of the nice things
with our few kids who have gone off to
college over the last couple of years is that
they have been able to fill a lot of different
holes for those college coaches. They can
do more than just one thing well.
I think training IM kids is so much variety,
keeps things fresh for both the coaches
and the swimmers and I like knowing that
we’re going to do something completely
different today from what we did yesterday
and I think the kids like that too. Just as far
as team points, they can score in nine or
10 different events when they go to a meet,
even a big meet, which is much better than
having them win the 50 free, win the 100
butterfly and not be able to swim anything
else. But it’s really challenging because so
many different bases need covering and
it’s hard to do that.
Why the 400 IM? At York it’s predominantly
an aerobic program: I don’t build sprinters
so we definitely are into building the base
and that starts from the youngest kids.
Success in the 200 IM, especially in the
short course, tends to go to the big and
the strong and I have absolutely no control
8
over how big they are and in York for some
reason the kids tend to be very small. It
must be something in the water but I need
something that I can control and for the 400
IM it’s usually success goes to the toughest,
the hardest workers, the most consistent
kids. That’s the kind of kids I want to coach
anyway. That’s what IM training – those
are traits that IM trying to build so it fits
in perfectly with what I want from my
swimmers. Then also it’s just much easier
to race down if you’ve trained for the 400
IM to go down to the 200 and most people
realize or at least agree that the 200-yard
IM is a very different animal from the 200meter and if you’ve been training for the
400, it’s easy to go to the 200 IM.
Well, when do kids, in our program at
least, really start racing the 400 IM? They
probably start training for it at 11 although
we don’t do very many 400 IMs in practice.
We kind of set things up stroke by stroke
day by day. But when do they start racing
it? There’s no real answer. It varies so
much from one kid to another. Basically
when they’re ready and by that I mean
they’re ready to race it and they see the
400 IM as a race and not a survival game.
I don’t like to watch kids survive a race. I
want to see them go for it and they let me
know in practice whether they’re ready to
do that. Then also – and this does matter to
me – it needs to be esthetically pleasing. I
do not want to watch 400 meters of awful,
ugly swimming so they need to have four
solid strokes and they need to be able to
race with four solid strokes. With our better
kids they’re usually doing their first 400 IMs
late 11, early12 with some of the – maybe
second-tier kids. They’re waiting or IM
waiting for them until they’re maybe 13
but by the time they’re 13 and 14s pretty
much everybody is racing the 400 IM and
I do mean everybody. They can’t avoid it
because I won’t let them.
It is really challenging, I think, to train well
for a 400 IM because, as I said, there are
so many things that need doing and at the
Y and our very small coaching staff are
tremendously short staffed so we’re trying
to keep track of – in the senior group I am
on deck alone and trying to keep track of
30 kids and splits and repeat times and
comparing them to goal splits and goal
finishing times and all that and it just is
enough to make your head spin. And when
you consider that you’re doing that for four
different strokes, it gets to be a little much
sometimes. Then also, I think, for the
swimmers it’s difficult for all four strokes
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
to be feeling really good at the same time.
Even with our top kids I don’t think we’ve
been to a really big meet where all four
were – an individual swimmer said all four
things were working really well. There’s
always something that’s a little off and so
that means with three or four days or a
week to go before Nationals I am trying
to figure out how to get this backstroke
on track. Breaststroke’s okay. Fly is
okay. Free is okay but oh my God, what
do we do with the backstroke? That’s
kind of a normal situation, I think. At
least it is in our program as it is hard
to have everything working at the same
time, around taper time especially.
I think when you do an IM program
the kids aren’t going to make as quick
progress at any one thing. I’m absolutely
certain that our swimmers would be better
at – well, in one case a 200 butterfly or in
another case a 200 freestyle or whatever
if I wasn’t training them so broadly and so
generally. That probably hurts them a little
bit when they’re being recruited by college
coaches but on the other hand, like I said,
they’re going to be good at a whole bunch
of different things so they might not be
quite as good at one thing but they’re
going to be very good at a whole bunch of
them. I’m hoping that versatility will make
up for the lack of superstardom.
I think it’s a principle that you can’t be good
at everything. You do have to choose your
spots and I know that we’re weaker at the
shorter events. If you look at our high-tech
results and compare our 200 fly with our
100 or two back with our 100 or 4 IM with
our two, etc., etc., you’ll find that pretty much
across the board our kids are stronger at the
200 form strokes, the 400 free, the 400 IM,
etc., and that’s just a byproduct of the way
we’re training them. Again they’ll be able to
come down if that’s the need once they’re
old enough in college. That’s somebody
else’s responsibility once they get there
but there were going to be holes and that’s
one of ours. We’ve had some kids who are
pretty good at the mile but I think that’s for
the most part by accident just because I
think they’re really good aerobically, they’re
tough, they have pretty good strokes and
they have a really good sense of pace. It’s
not that they’re really milers. It may be that
they are and I just haven’t made them into
it yet but it’s just again a byproduct of what
we are training the kids for.
The six desiderata. The goal is I want
successful 400 IMers. There you go. Then
I take a look at what tools do I need to try
“I think training
IM kids is so
much variety.”
Source: Krcrtv.com
to give the swimmers, figure that out and
then I train them for that. I think there are
six keys to the 400 IM. I’ll just go through
them really quickly, list them and then I’ll
talk about each one. First, kids need to be
aerobically very fit and tough. Second, they
need to be strong in all four strokes. Third,
they need to be technically strong in all four
strokes. Fourth, they need good aerobic
speed and I’ll explain what that means
in a little while. Fifth, they must be able
to transition from one stroke to the next
in an IM and then sixth, they need to be
smart tactically which means an intelligent
allocation of their resources. With that list
we’ll go through them one by one.
Aerobically, they need to be very fit, very
tough. You cannot fake a 400 IM. You
can kind of fake a 200-yard IM but 400
IM, you are out there and you are showing
everybody your training and again I like – I
like to train people for that. I like tough kids
so 400 IM shows what I want to see. In our
program we’re trying to build the widest
possible foundation for their training. In the
old days we called it a distance base. That
is – that is the foundation of our program
and I think that kids need to be trained
and then expected to do things right under
stress and fatigue. Absolutely necessary
if you want to look good the last 50 of a
400 IM. You need to practice to do that as
you’re going to be hurting like crazy if you
pushed it and you need to be able to swim
fast and look good while you’re doing that.
Okay, strong in all four strokes. We train
all four strokes and I’ve read some books
that argue that freestyle should be used as
the major aerobic training stroke and then
the other three strokes are more technical,
more speed, whatever, so freestyle is to be
used to condition swimmers. Well, I don’t
think that. We condition swimmers in all
four strokes. We work technically in all four
strokes and we do speed work in all four
strokes and that’s why there’s so much to
take care of as I mentioned before. We’re
not afraid to do long sets of breaststroke or
backstroke or butterfly although I say the
breast and the fly with some qualifications.
I’ll get to those in a little bit but we work
all four strokes and if we’re working on
backstroke, for instance, we primarily
work on backstroke in the context of
a backstroke set. We don’t do many
days or many days a week of IM sets
or IM training and the reason is if you
have a bad backstroke in an IM, your
backstroke cannot be good. If you have
a good backstroke, you backstroke in
an IM may be good if you can transition
well. So first we work on, say, in this
case backstroke. We work on backstroke
sets. We do long backstroke sets. We
take them seriously and midway and
then especially as we transition into
the peak period of our season towards
championships then we’ll start to do a lot
more of transition work. But if you want a
good backstroke leg, you’ve got to be a
good backstroker, so we focus on that.
Generally we work one main stroke each
practice. Sometimes we modify that by
doing, for instance, a technique set right
after warm-up of whatever the main stroke
is going to be tomorrow because I don’t
believe in piggybacking a technique set
and one stroke and then following it with
a killer aerobic set, because I think that
just trains the stroke technique right out of
them so I prefer to separate those.
Another modification would be if we, again
right after warm-up, begin with a problem
stroke, either one that’s general to a group
or I might let individuals decide which is
the stroke in the IM that’s giving them
the biggest trouble and then we could go
on to our main set. For the most part all
swimmers in a group do the same program
so I don’t have the breaststroke lane or
butterfly lane or backstroke or sprint lane,
a distance lane or anything like that. Once
kids do get, say, senior in high school I
might have a group that’s more focused
on the 200 IM in comparison with a bigger
group that’s focused more on the 400 if
swimmers have shown me that a 400 just
isn’t their bag. Then we’ll drop them down a
little bit. Then even though everyone might
be doing essentially the same program,
we have different sendoffs with almost
every single lane so every single person is
being challenged and kids can move back
and forth between lanes if they’re having a
great day or a terrible day but everybody is
getting challenged even if we have a huge
range of abilities in the group.
We do a lot of technique work because
even though I don’t have a long course
pool and I don’t have access to a long
course pool, we still train for the 400 meter
IM and if you don’t have good strokes,
you don’t have a race so I want to see
good, pretty swimming. We do a lot of
technique work but we do very, very little
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
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“
Faster
Swimmers
Should Absolutely
ExploiT tHeir
”
Advantage
10
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
drill work. Almost all the technique we do
is in context of the full stroke. Swimmers
will race all strokes and distances when
they come to a meet. I don’t let them hide
from anything and if a swimmer shows a
proclivity to hide from something, that’s
the first thing I’m going to put them in and
I’m going to keep putting them in there
until they stop being afraid of it.
They’re not allowed to avoid things. You
need to face up to them and you need to
learn to be good at what you’re weakest at.
One of the little mantras I have with the kids
is that it’s okay if you’re bad at something
right now but you better be a lot better at it
six months from now because if you know
you have a glaring weakness and you want
to be good, well, you can’t let that glaring
weakness continue to be the barrier to your
getting better. It’s your job to fix it and I give
them lots and lots of opportunities to fix it.
The third is they need to be technically
strong in all four strokes and I break each
stroke down into fundamental skills and
then we will swim a full stroke and then
we’ll cycle through the various stroke
fundamentals or stroke cues or stroke
points. I kind of call them different things but
it’s the same thing and I call that a rainbow
focus, pass it on. I like to be able to get a lot
of good work done and if I have to wait until
every single person has finished a repeat
before I tell the entire group what I want
them to work on next, we don’t get anything
done so we’ll do, say, 50s or 75s or 25s.
It doesn’t really matter and then as soon as
the first group has finished a repeat I’ll yell to
them what the focus is for the next one. It’s
their job to pass it on. Second guy passes
it on to the third, the third to the fourth, all
the way down the line and if somebody
doesn’t pass it on and leaves his comrades
completely clueless, they usually will do
10 or 15 pushups to confess their sins and
make sure they do it better the next time.
But it’s really important. If your job is to let
your teammates know what the focus is and
you’re not doing that, well, that’s a problem.
We can’t get any work done and everyone
behind you gets worse instead of better
from what we’re doing so we do that sort
of format a lot of the time. Sometimes
I’ll let the swimmers take charge of it
by saying that the leader in a lane gets
to decide on the stroke focus. It’s still
everybody’s responsibility to pass on
the message but each lane might be
doing something different from the rest
but again most of our technique work is
done just like that rainbow focus passing
it on, working on one stroke fundamental
at a time, cycling through the list for each
stroke so that kids are always swimming
attentively. They’re always working on
being greater and more efficient in the
water and they’re never just slugging
through. I hate watching slugging. I want
to see pretty swimming. I spend a lot of
time – I almost said I have to. I get to
spend a lot of time on deck – I want to
make sure it’s very pleasurably spent.
With each stroke I want to talk about
how we train that stroke.
With butterfly most of our work is full
stroke, not all and most of that limited
to short repeat distances swum very
fast, very well. We do a few drills with
the seniors. I think there are two drills
basically with our junior kids. They may
do four really simple one-arm drills and
alternating single, double, single, double
so there are nothing that probably you
guys don’t do. We do a very small
number of drills. We try and make sure
that they’re done very well and we spend
most of our time swimming the full stroke.
One of the main training formats that we
use in butterfly I call it Sara Dotzels, named
after the girl that worked on them with me.
There we go. To sort of polish and find the
good way of training fly fast. Essentially
we’ll just alternate 25 free 25 fly, really
simple and we’ll do those in ladders 100,
200, 3, 4, 5, 6 and back down or whatever
or 10 200s or whatever. The trick is you
start from the very first repeat swimming
fly really fast. The freestyle’s a little more
moderate but then you’d descend all the
way through the set so the freestyle pace
goes up and up and up. The butterfly pace
stays very, very fast, so in other words the
heart rate is climbing and climbing and
climbing while your are holding race pace
butterfly. That’s what I call aerobic speed
and that’s why our kids can do 200 butterfly
pretty well and usually they will be asked to
swim faster than their best time for a 200
butterfly by the end of the set like, race best
historical time in the 200 fly so you get kids
swimming really fast and doing some really
nice-looking butterfly while they’re doing it.
For backstroke, it’s a very important aerobic
training stroke for us. We’ll do probably
every couple of weeks with our senior kids
and once a week or so with our junior kids a
long backstroke set, 2,500 up to 35 or even
4,000 meters. Most of the time we train
short course meters and we’ll do a long set.
It won’t necessarily be very hard. I’m not
yelling at them to go faster and race and
all that. Usually they’ll build their speed but
I think it’s really effective at building good
backstrokes. They can get into a lovely
backstroke rhythm when they do that.
The intensities are low enough that they
ca work on their stroke and they’re not
just trying to swim faster trying to make
an interval and then also I can talk to
them or at least give them hand signals
and communicate with them while they’re
swimming without them having to stop
everything for a 50 or whatever. And then
also – and I think this is kind of important
– when they’re doing a long swim like
that, they don’t have me in their face all
the time. I’m not nagging them.
I’m not getting their times or whatever so
they have a little bit of a break and even
though I wish they always appreciated my
comments to them, I know that sometimes
they don’t and they just want to ignore me
and do 3,000 backstroke. They can kind
of do that and then I may give them little
technique pointers or whatever but that’s
different from saying “Okay, I want to see
a 112 on this one. Now I want to see a
110. Okay, 108” or whatever. It gives them
a little bit of a break. On backstroke we
pretty much have one stroke drill and that’s
one-arm backstroke. I think it simplifies the
stroke and allows them to really focus on
the catch, the entry and then the catch and
it doesn’t mess up the stroke rhythm.
On breaststroke, it’s often the weak stroke
in an IM and usually the kick is the problem.
I think the biggest difference between the
really good breaststrokers and the poor
breaststrokers is the strength of the kick and
I think most of that difference in strength lies
in swimmers anatomy. Some kids are built
like a duck and they kick like it. It’s great
but if you have somebody who’s pigeon
toed or just normal, they might not be able
to put their body, namely their feet, ankles,
knees, whatever, into the kinds of positions
that a really good breaststroker can and as
a result their kick just isn’t very strong. So
we spend time almost every s single day
on breaststroke leg stretches, now with five
or six stretches that are really focused on
breaststroke in particular and then another
five or six for more general leg flexibility.
I think that really helps because if you
don’t have God-made breaststrokers, you
need to make man-made breaststrokers
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
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or at least people who can be pretty
competitive with the really good guys as
much as possible so, like I said, we do
leg stretching several times a week. We
do more drills on breaststroke than we do
in any other stroke. I’m not going to list
a ton for you because I have absolutely
no new original drills. I love double- and
triple-kick breaststroke meaning one pull,
two kicks or one pull, three kicks. I love
the two strokes on the surface, dive down,
three strokes underwater or four kicks
underwater or four pulls underwater so
basic Mike Barrowman drills, nothing new.
We do those a fair amount and we used
to do them just long and smooth and
very pretty and it made for very slow but
somewhat pretty breaststrokes. Well I need
kids to be able to get going in an IM so now
we do our breaststroke drills after the first
couple of weeks. When we’re making sure
the technique is the way we want it, we’ll
start doing some really fast breaststroke
drills so it’s for time, their goal times for
them. They’re doing it really hard and fast
and I think that’s probably more important
for the kids who aren’t good at breaststroke
than necessarily the kids who are, as you
have to make that gap in some way.
For freestyle we just this season started
doing a few front end drills like dog paddle
and human stroke or human drill, whatever
you call it. Up until the last few weeks
we’ve done zero, none, out of principle
but I finally decided that well, let’s just see
if this works because I want to make sure
that our front ends, our catches were really
good because I think that is the single most
important stroke point in freestyle. If you
want to be good, you need to have a good
catch. You don’t get a hold of the water
up front, you’re never going to get it so
we do spend a lot of time on making sure
the kids are good at that wrist cock, elbow
turn, high elbow press. We do most of our
freestyle technical work in the context of the
full stroke but now we have added a few of
those dog paddle type things to really focus
on just that first foot or so of the stroke.
We do a lot of technical work and we focus
on distance per stroke a lot. We focus on
balance and by that I mean trying to make
sure that kids are even left to right and even
breath to non-breath. I know that there are
a number of elite world-class Olympian
champion swimmers, freestylers, especially
males who have a big lope in their stroke
and even though I understand that they are
really, really fast, I don’t think that is a good
12
thing to be teaching your younger kids.
I want to see an even and balanced
stroke. Most of our swimming is done
breathing every third although when we’re
focused on balance per se, I’ll have kids
alternate, if we’re doing, for instance,
100s, the first length they’d breathe every
third, second length every left, third length
every right, last length every five so that
they’re changing the breathing pattern
every 25. The goal is to have the freestyle
feel the same all for four patterns and I
ask them to pay attention to the feel of
the stroke, how solid the catch feels under
these different circumstances and we put
a lot of premium in trying to make for really
consistent stroking on freestyle.
”
We’ll also do a lot of our rainbow focus
work with freestyle. We’ve got eight or 10
or whatever it is stroke points. We’ll cycle
through those, a lot of technique work
with almost all of it in the context of the full
stroke. We probably do less freestyle than
most programs. It’s because we do a lot of
back. We do a lot of breast. We do a lot of
fly and that means there’s less time and
space for freestyle and I’m sure in some
respects that hurts us in particular since
there’s a 50, a 100, a 200, a 400 and 800,
a 1,500, a 200 relay, a 400 relay and an
800 relay. That is a lot of freestyle. I think
that’s a ridiculous way of setting it up and
when I’m in charge it’s going to be different
but [Laughter] for right now in IM it sure it
hurts us a little bit but, like I said, I want
the kids to be good across the board and
by prejudicing one stroke I don’t think that
serves the kids as well in the long run.
We work on IM every single day in warmup. We essentially have a “Big Mac” where
it’s five parts and the bread is a 400 IM,
two 200 IMs and four 100 IMs and then the
patties, the two patties, are first, whatever
is going to be the main stroke of the day
and then the second one is whatever is the
minor stroke of the day so the format is built
just like a Big Mac which, by the way, I have
our swimmers not eat because – they’re
not good for them but it’s a nice image or
analogy for how we start off every day.
We only train actual IM sets maybe once
a week. Could be twice a week and every
now and then, but for the most part it’s just
once a week and when we do, it’s usually
incorporating a lot of different distances.
It’s done just like most of our training, in
a descending format where I’m asking
kids to work down to race speeds and
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
goal race speeds by the end of a round
or by the end of a set. I like watching fast
swimming and when we do IM, it’s fast.
We do – and I got this when I coached at
North Baltimore – we do a fair amount of
our longer IM in a free IM format where
you do freestyle instead of butterfly so it
would be free, back, breast, free. On days
when we do a long free IM set we might
start it off with a short butterfly set just so
I don’t accept their excuses
“Well, I’m exhausted.”
Well, good. Hop on the block.
that we’re not completely neglecting that
first leg of an IM but when the kids do free
IM, they can swim really fast.
I think that if a swimmer is working down
very, very close to their 400 IM best
speed by the end of the set during free
IM versus being 10 seconds slower than
that if they start off with butterfly, it’s a
tradeoff that I will make because the last
300 of that swim is going to be very, very
close to what I’m going to see in the race.
At least, I hope so. Whereas, when you
start off with the butterfly - especially if
you’ve done a long set up to then - that
100 butterfly takes a lot more out of you
than the first 100 does of a race when
you’re fresh, when you’re doing it from a
dive; etc. So we do a fair amount of free
IM and we do it really, really fast.
The fourth is good aerobic speed and I’ve
mentioned this already, I think, once, and
the way we train is primarily descending
sets. It’s primarily short rests so the
heart rates stay up and I’m expecting
that the swimmers are working toward
their race speeds and goal race speeds
and if they can do that on a short rest
because of the way sets are designed, I
think they’re training very specifically for
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
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400 IM success. I wouldn’t be that sure
if we were doing 100 IMs on the long
rest or 200 IMs on long rest or whatever.
Keeping that heart rate up is, I think,
very important. Also they can and they
know they can swim very, very fast when
they’re dead tired. I make sure that they
do. I don’t accept their excuses “Well,
I’m exhausted.” Well, good. Hop on the
block. We’re doing a 200 IM for time.
They’re expected to do that and even the
most stubborn of them figures it out after
not too long that they can a lot more than
they ever thought they could.
I think that knowledge is really important on
the fifth day of Far Westerns when you’ve
been out on the pool deck for 14 hours a
day for four days or you’re at Nationals and
you’re coming on the last day and there’s a
lot of pressure and you’re trying to make a
team or whatever. There are lots things that
you need to take into consideration that are
going to be thrown at you so you need to
be tough. You need to be able to take just
about anything and I train so that our kids
will be really tough and really adaptable.
T:11”
Fifth, they can transition well from one
stroke to the next. I mentioned that most
important is being able to do the stroke
really well and I think you get that best
by training the stroke by itself but you do
need to be able to transition as well. You
see it all the time, kids who are really good
backstrokers whose backstroke leg in an
IM will be horrendous because they’re
super tired from having done 100 butterfly
so they have a weapon but don’t get to use
it effectively because they don’t know how
to go from one thing to another. I think it
helps their transition work, maybe not the
fly to back, but all the others by doing free
IM because the speeds can be faster. They
can be closer to what the eventual goal is.
Some kids will have problems with certain
transitions and we will do some work even
early season but not much on specific
transitions where if I’ve noticed that this
group of kids has problems with their fly to
back, then we might focus on that on one
day. Another group – another subgroup has
problems with the back to breast, that will
be their focus. Another’s breast, free, that
will be their focus so we do have the kids
do some very specific transition work but
for the most part early and mid-season it’s
context to the whole IM or free IM and then
once we get closer, we’ll essentially work in
the middle 200. I want kids to be very, very
good at the middle 200 of their 400 IM. We’ll
time them and they will be expected to go
their goal times for that 200 and…
A very typical transition focus set and
I’ll just give one of these, we may do
four times 50 back, breast where they’re
descending one to four, four 100s back,
breast, descending one to four, four 150
back, breast descending one to four and
four 200 back, breast descending one to
four. They’re expected to try and hold the
speed, the pace and improve the pace as
they go through the longer distances and
by the end I want them swimming crazy
fast. Like I said, they’re expected to go as
fast or faster than their goal race speeds
at the end of the season. Obviously that
would just be on the fourth repeat. They
aren’t going to start quite that fast. There
are several other types of transition sets
but really we don’t do anything that you
guys don’t do I’m sure.
Sixth is they need to be smart tactically
(intelligent allocation of resources).
Especially in an IM because the strokes are
changing, kids have to know themselves.
They have to understand their pacing.
They can’t get caught up in somebody
else’s race, somebody else’s strengths
and weaknesses. One of our very best
400 IMers (very talented, very gifted) can
do a wonderful job when she’s in control
of a race but when she’s around people
who are faster than she is, it muddles her
thinking and she can’t be comfortable.
It really shows. You can’t even tell it’s the
same swimmer so obviously one of the
things that I haven’t done well enough
yet and first on our list of things to
work on for this upcoming season before
Olympic Trials is getting her to expand
her comfort zone so she can essentially
put the blinders on and swim her race
instead of getting caught in the act that
she’s behind or whatever. This is a hard
thing to do even for kids who are really,
really good and it’s something that I try
and have them work on by, for instance,
putting them next to somebody who’s a
lot faster at the front end of the race in
practice so that they’re going to be behind
when they race this person in practice and
they’ve got to deal with that. With any luck,
that will transfer over to what we see when
we go to the big meet.
We expect kids to know how to use a clock
and to use it all the time so they know how
fast they’re swimming in practice and I’ll be
asking them this stuff all the time. If we’re
doing 300s, I might not ask what their time
was on a repeat but I’ll ask them, “What
was your pace per hundred?” because
that’s what I care about. If a swimmer
needs to go a 1:09.5 in her backstroke
leg of a 400 IM, well, then I need her to
know how close she is to that pace so the
pace per hundred for us is really, really
important. Kids are expected to know their
not only overall repeat times but their splits
along the way. They’re expected to know
their goal splits, their goal times so that
they’ve got a nice comparison between
what they just did, where they have been,
where they want to go. Now it’s probably
the case that not all of my swimmers will
know that on every single repeat, but that
is the goal. I want them to have a lot of – a
lot going on in their heads and know how to
put what they’re doing in context.
Then last, we practice being very goal
oriented all the time, not just once for a
season or once for a meet but the kids
are setting goals all the time. When I am
expecting them to be racing or expecting
them to swim at race speeds, they’re, I
hope, setting those goals down to that
with every set we do, with every round of
a set we do so if I want someone to go
1:09 on the end, I want I want to see a
1:15 at the beginning and then a 1:13 and
then a 1:11 and then a 1:09 so that they’re
not only getting to the goal at the end but
they’re getting there in a fairly systematic
way and swimming with the same stroke
through that range of speeds.
I’m sure your kids do this. Mine do it and
it drives me nuts where a swimmer on a
descend set will go, for instance, 1:18,
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
15
1:17.8, 1:17.6, 1:04 and they swim one
stroke for the first three that don’t matter
in their heads and then a completely
different stoke swimming on the last one.
Well, I don’t want to watch them destroy
water molecules on the last repeat when
they’re going fast. I want to see them
swim well throughout a range of speeds,
so descend means control, descend, very
systematic down to what I want to see.
Okay, well enough on what I want to make
my kids into and what I want to be able –
what I want them to be able to do. Motivation
for training a 400 IM: It’s probably harder to
get them to do that than it is to train for a
200 IM. It’s harder. It’s longer. You have
to be more consistent. Like I mentioned
earlier, the training matters so much more
than how big you are. So first way that I try
to do this is I value IM and the kids know
that. It kind of exudes from my pores and
that the 400 IM swimmer is the complete
swimmer and that’s what we’re trying to
be. If I favor any stroke, it’s the IM so I
don’t put a premium on who’s just doing
butterfly or backstroke. It’s who can do
all of them kids pick up on this. They can
tell what you think is important and to a
large extent what you think is important is
what they think is important if your reward
system reflects that because they want to
be rewarded in various ways.
The team’s recent history, I think, helps a
lot. The better swimmers in our program
have been strong in the 400 IM and I
mentioned at the very beginning that
we’ve gotten a couple of kids on to the
national junior team and that they’ve been
400 IMers and we have several kids
qualified for Olympic trials and every one
of them has the 400 IM. At juniors I think
a year ago we had six or seven kids and
everyone had the 400 IM so it’s just part of
the way we do things and kids want to be
good at that event and train for it so they
should be but I value it a lot. The best kids
who are acting as the example, the role
models on our team who are setting the
standards for the other kids, they’ve been
very good at the 400 IM. That helps a lot.
We use USA Swimming’s IMX program
extensively. One of the glories of that
program is that the computers do all the
work. All you need to do is press a few
buttons and it gives you a listing by age
group of your kids IMX scores ranked top
to bottom. It gives you the number of points
they’ve scored in each of the events and
the percentage of the total that they have
16
scored in each of those events. It shows
how they rank nationally by zone, by LSC
and within the team. It’s wonderful if you
have a group of competitive – and I try
to build competitive kids – they look at a
list like that and go to town.
When the list is posted, it’s public and
it gets updated after each meet or as
close to it as possible, the competitive
kids are going to step forward and, as I
mentioned, we’ve had at least one IMX
NAG champion in each of the last four,
five seasons, whatever as well as a whole
bunch of top 10s so the kids, they get
very competitive about the IMX. We take
it seriously. I take it seriously. They get
their T-shirt if they score a certain level of
points and they will do almost anything for
a free honor T-shirt because you have to
have reached a fairly high level to get one.
I think IMX also helps get kids to work on
their weak strokes. Sometimes it’s very
difficult to have someone focus and be as
intense and aggressive and as thoughtful
on the stroke that they’re terrible at as on
the stroke that they’re relatively best at. We
all like to do what we’re good at. A 10-yearold, a 13-year-old is no different but when
the goal is to raise your IMX score and
your IMX ranking and you see right there in
black and white that breaststroke score is
100 or 200 points lower than all the rest, it’s
pretty clear even to a 10-year-old that oh
my goodness, I really, really need to work
on my breaststroke more.
The IMX, I think, has been the single most
effective way that I have gotten kids to work
their weak strokes over the couple of years
and I didn’t really have to do anything other
than post the list. So we use IMX a lot. It’s
important in our program and I think finally
in getting kids to train for the 400 IM, we
don’t favor any one stroke. Butterfly, it’s
important. It’s important that they swim it
fast and they swim it well. Breaststroke is
important. It’s important that they swim it
fast and swim it well, etc. So I don’t just
say, “Oh well, you’re not a breaststroker.
You can kind of take the day off.” I try and
put just as much pressure on them on every
stroke and not just what they have the best
chance of placing well at Far Westerns or
Nationals or Junior Nationals or whatever
so we take all four strokes seriously.
I want to spend a few minutes on tactics.
I’ll try and be fairly quick. Especially in short
course and this gets said by pretty much
every speaker, you have to be good at
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
walls. You have to exploit the walls. I think
it’s important also that you’re not only good
at the underwater dolphin but on how you
transition to the swimming. I see a lot of kids
who may be really good for six dolphins but
then they come to a crashing halt and then
start swimming backstroke or butterfly or
whatever. It’s really important that you learn
all the parts of that process, the push-off.
Make sure it’s at the right depth, the dolphin
itself, the tempo of the dolphin, the power of
the dolphin and how that gets transitioned
into swimming. It’s more than just being
good at doing dolphins really fast for a
three-second burst. You have to – you have
to be a little more subtle than that.
In long course I think it’s really important
that swimmers build each 50. You have
to finish everything strong. I watch so
many swimmers who are wonderful for
the first 15 meters of a 50-meter length.
The middle 15 is getting a little suspect
and the last 15 meters is much slower.
There’s tempo decay.
There’s speed decay and one of my
basic principles of coaching is when I see
everybody making a mistake, we try and do
the opposite so if they’re going to go superfast the first bit and then fade, we’re going
to make sure that we build so that while
everybody else is slowing down, we’re
speeding up. It’s also good psychologically
because when somebody has this happen
to them eight times on a 400 where they’re
just getting passed at the last 10 meters,
psychologically they’re pretty much done
by the last length. If your kids can be the
ones who are making those passes, that’s
a pretty effective way, I think, to swim fast
and win races in long course so we always
finish strong. We never fade into a wall.
Each swimmer has stronger strokes and
weaker strokes and one of the fun things
about training IM and racing IM is using
the tactics of exploiting your strengths and
hiding weakness as best you can and
coming up with that overall successful race.
I think it’s important that swimmers are in
a position to use their strengths and a lot
of times that isn’t the case. I’ve got a few
really, really strong breaststrokers whose
fly and backstroke are abysmal. They get
to their weapon, their biggest weapon, the
stroke where they’re going to just go to
town and they’re 20 meters behind.
Well, way to go. You’re going to use your
weapon to try and catch back up to dig
yourself out of a hole that you’ve dug
instead of using your weapon to beat
people, to pass them, to go by them.
You have to be in a position to use your
strengths and I think for the most part your
key stroke isn’t your biggest weapon. It’s
the one right before that. If you’re a really
good breaststroker, you’ve got to have
a good backstroke so that you are in a
position to use that breaststroke. If you’re
a really good backstroker, you need to
have a strong fly especially technically
so that you can be in a position to take
advantage of your strength so I distinguish
between a weapon, the best stroke, and
then a swimmer’s key stroke. They’re not
the same. I don’t think.
I think in a 400 IM – a 400 long course IM
the idea of key strokes and weak and strong
strokes counts doubly. The 400 long course
IM is a different animal from that short
course. You have to be much stronger.
In racing the 400 IM, just kind of a few
suggestions for each stroke: on butterfly
relax the first 50 and then build momentum
in that second 50. I see it all the time.
People will go crazy fast the first 50 and
then struggle home so that they’re reaching
the backstroke leg and they look absolutely
exhausted already so I like kids who’ve got
good technique and kind of float that first
50 so nice and fast coming home and they
are going full speed going into backstroke.
I think that’s important. You want to come
into that transition of full speed and usually
when a swimmer has gone out really fast in
butterfly, it destroys not just the butterfly. It
destroys backstroke too. I like to see maybe
a three- to four-second difference between
the first and the second 50 of butterflies at
the most and when I see five, six, seven,
eight, 10 seconds difference, it’s like we
need to reevaluate our tactics for the 100
butterfly on the front end.
On backstroke, I think that for a lot of
swimmers it’s the key stroke. Technically
I want them to increase the tempo, to
lay off the legs and I’m pretty sure that
Bob Bowman said exactly the same thing,
probably Dick Shoulberg and probably
Gregg Troy. A pretty common – a really
good effective way to destroy your race
is to destroy your legs on the backstroke
leg so lay off them. Make sure the body
position is really good so you’re just like
a cork floating and up the tempo so it’s a
little bit more aerobic and a little bit less
muscular effort on backstroke and a lot of
kids will kind of take the day off on their
backstroke leg, even good backstrokers,
because they’re tired after butterfly or
they’re waiting for breaststroke to make
a move so you can really take over a
race if they will go on the backstroke. So
if a kid builds that butterfly, they’re really
finishing the fly well and then takes off on
backstroke, that’s what I like to see.
Breaststroke, I think it’s absolutely crucial
for sorting out the medals and there’s
the biggest difference between the best
breaststrokers and the worst breaststrokers,
a bigger difference on breaststroke than
there is in the other three strokes so you
can lose or you can gain the most ground in
that 100 of your race. Faster breaststrokers
should absolutely exploit their advantage
and attack with guns blazing the whole way
and if they have set up their breaststroke
by having a nice backstroke, all the better.
Most kids are probably not going to be as
strong at breaststroke, so for the weak
breaststrokers we have a few rules. If you
don’t have a kick like Kitajima, you’re not
allowed to glide like Kitajima.
I have some kids who have absolutely
no power in that kick at all and yet they
will just sit there in a streamlined position
for eight seconds between strokes.
Meanwhile anyone who’s any good is
just gone, so they’ve got to pick up the
tempo. It’s a little bit higher in the water
and much faster tempo if their kick isn’t
particularly good. They’ve got to control
the bleeding as much as possible and also
poor breaststrokers have got to have a
good backstroke and they’ve got to have
a good freestyle because you may be able
to compete well if you have one off stroke.
You cannot compete well if you have two
off strokes in a row. You’re gone. You
may get your best time but you’re going
to be so far behind the kids who are solid,
so that’s kind of part of the deal. If you’re
a bad breaststroker, you better be good
at everything else and then you need to
make sure that you are working on those
weaknesses in breaststroke as much as
possible so that six months from now we
don’t have the same problem.
On freestyle, I want to see kids begin the
freestyle leg with a sense of urgency. If
they’re ahead, they need to attack and
exploit that advantage because the other
kids are swimming breaststroke and you’re
doing freestyle and if you are going
to find a disparity, it’s there in speeds
so go for it and from the beginning.
Don’t wait and slowly build the first 50
and then attack the last 50. I like them
to go because your biggest advantage
comes those first 10 meters or so while
they’re doing breaststroke and you’re
doing freestyle. If one of my swimmers
is behind after breaststroke, they need to
try and catch someone right away. I see
it all the time where swimmers will just be
nice and stretched out and comfortable
the first 50 of the freestyle leg and then
at the wall they’ll go crazy. They’ll start
kicking. They’ll turn up their tempo. It
looks like a completely swimmer.
Well, if you had done that from the beginning
of that leg, you wouldn’t be different making
a furious attempt to catch the people who
are 10 yards in front of you. You’d be past
them already so don’t wait until it’s too little
too late to start swimming hard and start
swimming fast on freestyle. They’ve got to
try and catch someone and that someone
can be eight lanes over or it can be their
imaginary friend in their head. I don’t care
as long as they get after that freestyle leg.
You’ve got to try and catch someone right
away because catching someone in the
first 15 meters means you can then look
around and see if there’s anybody else for
the next 15 meters and you just kind of
play leapfrog over as many competitors
as you can. If you wait, you’re done for
so that means you have to be a little bit
tougher and a little bit stronger but I’m
trying to make my kids tough and strong
and fit so that they can do that.
Then last 15 meters or last 10 meters you
put your head down. Period. The air you
take in can’t help you physiologically. It
already hurts like crazy so it’s not really
going to hurt anymore and it is going to be
faster so you finish strong no matter what.
And – pretty good. Basically I’m done and
I’ve been told that I’m not allowed to field
questions because I’m going to be at the
Swimming World Television booth in a
few minutes and the Q&A session will be
televised so if you can hold your questions
for five minutes while I get to the television
station or studio, then ask away.
York YMCA Head Coach Michael Brooks
is a veteran of twenty-odd years of yearround club, high school, summer league, and
country club swimming coaching. He has
worked with all levels of swimmers, and daily
coaches ages ten to eighteen in his program,
so that he has the beginning, the middle, and
the end in sight and in mind all the while.
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
17
18
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
Wisdom
Compiled by John Leonard
Stimulated by coach doug wharam
The secret to wisdom is not having
the right answer, it is asking the right
question. Every now and then a wonderful
question comes in to the ASCA offices
and I share that question with a large
mailing list to see if anyone wants to take
a swing at it. Coach Doug Wharam, from
the Nashville Aquatic Club, asked one of
those timely and insightful questions.
John Leonard
Q: Any thoughts on how to get an
unengaged, totally wired-in generation of
kids to find meaning and value in swimming?
JL: This is an ESSENTIAL question.
I’d encourage anyone with ideas to
communicate them and share them with
the rest of us. If we can’t be good at this,
we can’t be good.
yourself. Love your life battles. Thank
God for difficulties. You don’t really feel
good being “comfortable” do you?
Not every child will respond to the above,
I have found, but MOST will - if you
persist. I do it consistently, with humor and humor with an edge - and finally, just
an edge. I don’t do this to be egoistic,
but to make sure I am one of the “most
interesting” people any child knows.
Most interesting does NOT equal
“popular,” but I work to engage them in
the sport as a preparation for life. We
talk about that all the time – every day. I
have gotten good at making it real.
Our
three
improvement:
“immutable
rules”
for
1) SHOW UP
Answer from Coach 1: Sure. I’m not
saying these are GOOD, but they are
my observations. I challenge value directly. What value do you get from your
(bleeping) phone? What matters to you?
Can you BE something of value without
DOING something of value to humanity?
Swimming is not an end. It is a MEANS to
understanding how to lead an influential
and socially useful life. Life is about
SERVING OTHERS! Serving yourself
with self-serving dribble and electronic
squiggles is not going to enrich your life.
What makes you feel BEST? Why?
The deeper the difficulty, the bigger
the challenge. The more COURAGE
required, the more you find value in
2) HONOR YOUR TEAMMATES WITH
YOUR EFFORT
3) DO THINGS CORRECTLY.
Each relates to life, not just swimming. I
hope that is of some small use.
Answer from Coach 2: Yes, of course
Coach 1 is right on. Kids have to care about people, about life, about being a role
model, a leader, and making a difference,
and you can’t do that on a cell phone.
We have weekly meetings on the topic
and always relate these macro views
back to being an athlete, a teammate,
and a swimmer. We make it clear that
they are inextricably tied.
And finally, after preaching, selling, and
imploring kids to walk a path of humility
and compassion, if they can’t or won’t,
we make it evident that they will not be in
the favor of the coach, i.e. respected as
a person, coached aggressively, moved
up, or remain on the team.
In twenty years, we have only “excused” one
swimmer, while averaging 75 swimmers in
the general Senior group.
Answer from Coach 3: I don’t always swim
hard, but when I do, I do it with the most
interesting coach in the world. Anyway, I’ll
take a quick crack at this working backwards
from your words. (Unengaged, wired-in,
meaning and value.)
What I heard is that the kids aren’t
unengaged, they are unengaged in
swimming, but engaged online. Their
meaning and value comes from the online
world. Here’s the hard part, it really does.
They form their relationships online and
they are used to instant feedback and
crave both getting and giving instant
feedback. What makes it tougher is that
they are terrified (yes, terrified) of being
offline. They don’t want to miss something,
or worse, be the subject of something.
The two hours they are in your pool might
be the longest period of time (other than
sleep) that they are offline all day, so we
do have to deal with real fear.
I am 100% in tune with the most interesting
coach in the world, but I might recommend
a step or two to bridge the gap between
fear (where I think your kids are now) and
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
19
Wisdom
(Continued)
Strategic engagement (I think) is the
missing step from unplugging the virtual
world to plugging in to the real one. Good
luck with it. You are giving them a great gift.
Response from Coach 1: Thanks,
Coach 3. The “Tell the Truth” comment as
#3 is very good for older athletes, I think,
but I coach 6-18 year olds, and I thought
“do things correctly” was less difficult to
understand. As I understand Frank’s “Tell
the truth,” is that it was largely about “not
kidding (fooling) yourself.” That concept
is difficult until some magical intellectual
level is reached in self-awareness. Some
get it at 8, some at 18, some of us slower
types, maybe at 38.
TELL THE TRUTH is more powerful.
“Do things correctly” relates better to age
groupers.
Honoring your teammates... becomes a big differentiator between the real and the virtual world.
challenge (where Coach 1 describes his
team). I think it is the simple, but deliberate,
step of engagement. You have to engage
them and they have to engage each other
as real, in the flesh, human beings. Your
team meetings, mental training, values
training, dryland, etc. all start this process,
then you move it in to the pool. By teaching
them how to be good teammates, you are
teaching them to move their relationships
from virtual to real. In our current era, that
might be your most valuable contribution.
In Coach 1’s (and Frank Busch’s) Laws
of Improvement, “show up” means all the
obvious stuff: be there, be on time, but
it also means REALLY be there. Have
your mental and emotional energy 100%
focused on the here and now (whether it
be math class, swimming, or your big date
with Suzie). You show up to your team,
your family, your friends, your teachers.
You show up in your relationships. You
show up in your commitments.
Honoring your teammates amplifies this
and also becomes a big differentiator
between the real and the virtual world.
Honoring your teammates (or your family,
or your friends, or your teachers) with
your efforts is something that can only
be done in the real world and it is the
greatest honor we can give. They can
tweet in the virtual world, but if they want
20
to write a novel or a song, that is the real
world of effort. They can get this. They
just went through Christmas. What shows
more honor, a gift card, a thoughtful gift,
or a hand painted portrait? 16 seconds,
16 minutes, or 16 hours?
Doing things correctly started out as Tell
the truth. The corollary of tell the truth is
hear the truth. No white lies. Don’t tell me
what I want to hear. We tell the truth and
are never punished for the truth (we may
be punished for the action, but never for the
truth). We also welcome the truth being told
to us. That is where we encounter humility.
Without humility, we can’t learn; we can’t
grow. When our coach or teammate redirects us on our path, our (non-humble,
ego-protecting) response if f___ you! Who
the hell are you? Humility replaces f___
you with thank you. We welcome and
appreciate the redirection and can feel
free to give it, because we will be thanked.
Telling the truth became living the truth and
living the truth became Doing things right.
Your challenge is to get them to unplug from
their phones and get them to plug in to each
other. When they experience the real high of
physically and emotionally interacting with
actual human beings, they will replace the
fear of missing out on their virtual world with
the fear of missing out on their real world.
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
This is a great contribution to the topic,
thanks.
Coach 4 expands the question: This
exchange is one of the most valuable
conversations that young coaches (and
quite possibly) old could be a part of today.
Eloquent and effective to coaching today.
But who can get coaches to plug into this
wisdom? I’m referring to the ones who may
be struggling to get their swimmers plugged
into pursuing “Swimming Excellence” (the
consistent application of their best self to
train to perform at the highest level they
are capable of) vs. having an “Excellent
Swim” once in a while.
Response from Coach 1: What is most
interesting to me here, is the “what is
VALUE”? to a human being question.
Then, how do we talk to young people
about that? It seems to me, once you
have a personal approach to answering
that question, you’re 99% of the way to
being a fulfilled human being.
I love sitting with my team kids and simply
ASKING QUESTIONS, then listening to the
answers and asking MORE questions.
“Do you give money to the begging bums
along I-95 exits?” “If so, WHY? If not,
WHY NOT?” Eventually, they ask me,
and the 20th time they ask, I answer
usually with the evolution of my thinking
on this - and I explain that your ideas
CHANGE as you age.
Just ask questions that make them THINK
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
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American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
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Wisdom
(Continued)
and RELATE. (Coach 2’s key point –
Engage!) It’s not much of a leap from there
to 10 x 400 free on hardest interval and the
“value” in that. It’s the old, “Why am I here
on earth,” religious question.
be ‘present’ to the screens of our phones,
iPods, tablets or TVs, than the people
and experiences that surround us. (This
is where Coach 2’s analysis of the ‘fear’
of being disconnected would fit in.)
Everything in my life points to “being of
service to others.” (Service being pretty
widely defined....An artist who never speaks
to anyone, creates inspiring art, thus speaks
to millions....great service!)
Even when we do engage our family and
friends our ‘listening’ mainly includes
crafting our response/reaction, rather
than enjoying and experiencing their
stories and point of view.
I am not sure I even KNOW excellence
anymore. Excellent to me, at age 65, means
a person who is “over-achieving” regardless
of their speed. Overachieving in life is a
great value. we can TEACH that, I believe.
We are always paying attention to
something. The question is what? Dan
Millman writes in The Way of the Peaceful
Warrior, “There are no ordinary moments.”
Each moment is special, but only if we are
in the NOW and HERE to experience it fully.
If not, we end up NOWHERE. Now here
and nowhere are the same 7 letters in the
same order, just with very different results.
Coach 5 adds perspective: I think Coach 1
and 3 (two of the most
interesting people I have ever encountered)
have hit the nail on the head.
As I travel the country I hear this more and
more from coaches, “How do we get the
kids to care - be engaged on a daily basis?”
There are so many tangents you can go
down with this and it is the biggest challenge
we face in coach education - it’s not science,
it’s not physiology, it’s not stroke technique
or race strategy - it’s being an effective
communicator, teacher and LEADER.
I’m not sure if this adds anything to the
conversation but it’s one of a short series
of reflections I’ve been writing for my
daughters and some friends and their
kids and it’s something I use any time I
talk to a group of athletes.
The time is always NOW and the place is
always HERE!
“Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a
mystery, and today is a gift, that’s why
they call it the present.” The ability to
stay engaged in the moment is one of the
most important skills for us to develop.
Now and here are the only time and place
where we can have any true effectiveness
or make any difference in our lives. (This
is inherently true of swim practice - of any
athletic training – and equally untrue of
on-line games - we can always start the
game over.) Too often, however, we are
distracted by memories and regrets, or
mesmerized by our future ‘plans’, hopes
and expectations. Especially in the age of
technology, we seem to be more willing to
As Coach 3 says, the key is connecting to
the athlete. Show them that you care about
them beyond the pool (the life lessons
Coach 1 talks about). Show them that you
care about the quality of TEAMWORK
and their practice. Show them that you
care about swimming fast. Our three rules
(stolen from Lou Holtz) are:
1. Always do your best (I think this implies
showing up).
2. Always treat others the way you would
like to be treated.
3. Always do the right thing (if you have to
ask if it’s the right thing; it probably isn’t).
Another Holtzism
Important Now.
-
WIN
-
What’s
By the way Coach 4, I LOVE this phrase
“pursuing ‘Swimming Excellence’ (the
consistent application of their best self to
train to perform at the highest level they
are capable of) vs. having an ‘Excellent
Swim’ once in a while.”
Coach 6 applauds the effort of the
group: This is excellent! It is just what I
was needing last night as I was covering
workouts for swimmers ranging from
7-14 yrs in age. I agree with Coach 4. It
is so valuable for all of us to be a part of
this discussion.
worry about losing touch with today’s child.
Last night I was excited, so fired up for the
swimmers who had accomplished so much
over the holidays, but on the other end, I
had great anticipation to greet the youngest
(who had a scheduled holiday break) and
those who CHOSE to take a break and help
them be just as excited about RE-engaging
and setting the example that would help
rebuild their positive return to swimming.
The holidays - when most everyone has
had the opportunity to break from their
daily norm of schedules (school, deadlines,
demands, homework) it is very natural
to disengage, but it is so much more
pronounced in today’s online world. For
all ages, the holiday season is anticipated
not for “playing outside” or physically
sharing time with friends. It is now about
allowing endless time (hours become days)
of being tuned in online for all the instant
gratification (feedback, entertainment,
gaming and constant contact) that any one
person could ever imagine.
This makes all 5 coaches’ (amazingly) dead
on ideals all the more important. They are
“Vital for Survival” for every coach.
As a person who craves connecting
with my athletes through leading team
talks, meetings, etc., they all NEED that
connection at this time more than ever.
But you have to HEAR THEM just like
they need to hear you. This time of the
season needs to FEED into your overall
teambuilding if you want to end with a
true TEAM in all senses.
Doug, thank you for having the selfconfidence and humility to ask and
share. This discussion wouldn’t have
happened without you.
Thanks to everyone for sharing! I want
more! I am always looking for ways to “get
into the minds” of my athletes.
Doug is a Senior Coordinator and Senior
Assistant at the Nashville Aquatic Club.
This is the perfect time of year/season for
this discussion, as most of us are dealing
with similar issues, no matter the age,
maturity, or level of athlete we focus on. I
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
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24
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
Training Camp Sets
North Bay Aquatics
By Don Swartz
We are almost done with our winter version
of “training camp.” This is when we can
plunge headlong into swim training without
the school issues that always compete for
everyone’s time and attention.
Our goal this “camp” was to keep the skill
building while getting in some intensity in the
sets. Everything we did was a combination
of skill development or high metabolic
rate work…of course we asked for and
sometimes received both. We keep working
on this part of the equation; skill plus fast
swimming leads to…duh, faster racing…
that’s our theory anyway!
We did a fair amount of kicking daily always
reminding our gang that kicking is 90% will
power…so quit looking for the easier way
and just bear down. We did a lot of kicking
with fins on tight intervals. An example
would be a set of 100’s on 1:20 blowing the
whistle at the 1:05 mark. We got a lot of kids
under 60 seconds for several rounds. We
shall see how this translates when we go
racing at our first development meet in two
weeks. We think they will have increased
levels of confidence in their kicking power.
The following are four sets we used with
some notes. As always, you can change the
intervals to suit your needs/group ability and
what you are after. We kept looking for more
intensity as a rule so when the interval was
generous we asked for fast swims while
when the interval was skimpy, we asked
everyone to make it, push into new territory.
1. • 10x300/4 fins and paddles; #1-3
last 3 laps fast, #4-6 last 5 laps fast,
#7-9 last 7 laps fast; #10 all laps fast;
question, how many went faster on
any of the first 9 than #10…if so why
do you think that happened?
• 4x25/.30 90%
• 2x50/1 fast as you can
• Simply keep going through the
rotation. When you have done 8
rounds of 4x25, 2x50 and 1x100 you
will have done everything twice.
4. • 10x25/.30 at 80%
• 10x50/1 at 80%
2. • 1x300/ tight interval – we went on
3:30, then 1x100/2 fast as possible
• 10x25/.30 at 90%
• 1x300/3:30
possible
• 10x25/.30 fast as you can
–
2x100/2
fast
as
• 1x300/3:30 – 3x100/2 fast as
possible…all the way to a round of
6x100/2 fast as you can
3. • 4x25/.30 smooth and relaxed –
flawless swimming
• 2x50/1 @ 80%
• 1x100/2 @ 90 %
• 4x25/.30 fast as you can
• 2x50/1 smooth and flawless
• 10x50/1 at 90%
• 10x50/1 fast as you can
• On this set the idea is to hold time
average on the 50’s and each time
through go 1 second faster on the
time average for those 50’s.
The one common thread on all these sets
is that very soon into the set no one was
talking between swims…lots of “gathering”
your resources and getting ready for the
next repeat. Lots of focus and a fair amount
of satisfaction afterwards…those that
leaned into it knew they had moved forward.
Nice!
• 1x100/2 80%
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
25
Operating a World Class
1000 Member
Swim Program
Presented at the 2013 ASCA World Clinic
By Coach Bill Rose
Introduction: (Mark Hesse) It’s my great
honor and privilege today to introduce
one of my personal heroes in coaching.
Somebody who’s done it all, collegiate,
club, international, I was trying to count up
how many U.S.A. international staffs he’s
been on and I think I lost count at 16.
So, I mean, just an amazing, successful
career spanning every facet of our sport.
And for the last 19 years, he’s been the head
coach of one of the most storied programs
in our sport, the Mission Viejo Nadadores.
And we have an exciting opportunity today
to hear from the CEO, the head man this
morning about how it’s set up and his vision
for the program. And then this afternoon,
hear from his staff on how they implement
that vision in the H Group program so, what
an exciting opportunity.
Coach Bill Rose is a member of the
ASCA Hall of Fame. He also has twice,
in the last five years, been named
the U.S.A. Swimming Developmental
Coach of the Year. So, just a broad
26
breadth of experience and a man who
coaches with as much passion and
compassion as anyone I’ve ever seen
on the pool deck. Coach Bill Rose.
Bill Rose: I can tell you this, just about a
week ago when we really started working
on this situation and saying, you know
talking about operating a world-class 1000
members swim program, I just sat down
and I said, “Oh my god, is that what we’re
doing?” I really don’t know on a day-today basis that that’s what we’re doing and
hopefully along the way, we could make it
so that we don’t think in such large terms.
We can think in a day-to-day program and
following along what we need to do to get
to the next day and be better the very next
day. You know, I’ve always enjoyed the
clinics and the speakers and the people at
the clinics and so on. This is a highlight
really of my year, every year to come to
this clinic. And the reason being is I go
home truly excited and you’ve heard this
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
before from other speakers, my swimmers
are a little bit nervous every time I come
home because I come home with so many
new and exciting things that I want to try
out and I want to make them that much
better and sometimes their concern, the
way I want to make them that much better
but it’s just a great, great situation. You
know; if you listen to what I’m saying, only
take two or three things from it.
We have our little staff meetings after
every talk and we sit down and I ask all
of our coaches to just come back to that
little staff meeting if you will and give
two or three things that they garnered
from that particular speaker because
everybody is gonna have something to
say. Hopefully, we all have something to
say. But, a lot of what we say may not
be exactly what works for you or works in
your program or beneficial to you. But I
think most of us will end up saying two or
three things that you can take back with
you. So, just pick those out.
A lot of things I say may not have anything
to do with you but try to put it into your own
context. And if you do that and you do that
for every speaker, that’s what’s going to
bring you back every time because you
have that much more to go on plus all
the other sessions that you have one-onone with all your coaching friends. You
know, we were established in 1968. And
we’re established because Mission Viejo
Company and the City of Mission Viejo now
was just a company back then and it was
one of the first great planned communities
in California. And it’s a beautiful place. All
the entire city is really built around children,
families and activities.
And so, throughout Mission Viejo as it was
built, that was the entire idea, bring the
families here and bring them here for all
the things that California in the dream has
to offer. With that in mind, in 1972, they
hired a young coach that turned out to be
a godsend. Mark Schubert literally made
Mission Viejo what it is today as far as
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
27
28
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
Nadadores are concerned. There were
the glory years during that time. And he fell
into some great situations and made other
great situations. And that’s what we all
have to do. Sometimes we get lucky.
Sometimes, swimmers come to our
organization and they’re already great and
we have that ability or hopefully we had
that ability to enhance what they came with.
When we came on the scene, it turned out
that not only did the city start producing
people that were recreation in mind,
etcetera and kind of just grew through that
kind of philosophy, but there were a couple
of teams in California that actually kind of
disbanded at that particular time and the
great ones showed up at Mission Viejo.
Again, Mark took them to great heights.
The other thing about Mission Viejo in that
day if you will, it was a company town. It
was owned by the Mission Viejo Company.
And that was the company that was
building all those houses and ultimately
100,000 people worth of houses. During
that time, they noticed again that the swim
team was doing a great job. The better
the swim team did the more reputation
and so on that the city or the company was
getting. They were building and selling
more houses because of it.
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
29
In my mind, they were quite intelligent. Do
what you have to do, Mark Schubert, keep
doing your magic and don’t worry a thing
about treasuries or whether you have to
write checks or anything like that. Just
do your job and turn in the receipts type
of thing, but don’t worry about asking for
anything, do it.”
Believe me, he did it.
Some of you people have been around
since the 1980s and 1970s and so on,
remember the armies that they marched
in with. He marched in with the Swedish
National Team one time at Nationals and
they were Nadadores after a week and a
half of being there at the training camp.
I mean, back in the day that was legal
and he did everything that was legal to
emphasize the team.
30
God bless him for it, now we have a lot
of Mission Viejo Nadadore rules. It’s the
Nadadore rule type of thing now with
foreign swimmers and so on. You can’t
score and all that good stuff. And so, at
least were famous in several directions
at that point. But the bottom line is that
he built that club and he did a great, great
job of it. He also built a club internally.
This is one thing we’ve got to realize too.
All of us have that ability and that hope
that we’re going to see someone that
started with our club and will go through
the club, then reach great heights.
Brian Goodell was really the very first
Mission Viejo guy that started about 7 or
8 years old on the Nadadores and went
through the entire program and became
the great swimmer that he was. And
indeed, thank you Mark Schubert, thanks
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
to Mission Viejo Nadadores for allowing
him to be able to get to that point. Lest
we forget, swimming on the way hasn’t
changed that much.
Bryan Dedeaux, 1976, I watched him. I
just went crazy. 15:02, in the 1500, at the
Olympic games in Montreal, 15:02. Let
me see, 35 years ago, 35 years ago, just
got through coming back from Nationals
about three weeks ago, 15:02, 3rd place,
one 2nd out of 1st place, 35 years later.
Believe me, swimming is progressing but
let’s not believe that there weren’t good
times back then as well.
I ran into Debbie Meyer, I saw her this
morning. She is the most, the hero of my life
as far as any girl swimmer I’ve ever seen. I
remember I was a very young coach at that
time and I watched her up in San Francisco
Previous Spread & Left: Olympic Training Center Training Trip- December 27, 2012- January 6, 2013.
State breaking yet another American record
etcetera, but this was a long time ago. This
was 1968 I think, 70 something, whatever.
It couldn’t have been that long ago.
Anyway, she was generations ahead of
her time, generations ahead of her time.
And this is what again, we have to look
for along the way, come across those
people, and covet those people, whether
again they move into your program or
they ran through your program.
We have a girl now named Chloe Sutton.
She’s only been with our program now
five years and it was kind of an interesting
story how she came. It was a Mark
Schubert thing. She was kind of what do
you call it, a military brat – well, I don’t
want to call her a brat. Her mom might
be in the audience but the fact is that she
had been bouncing around along the way
and never really landed anywhere but
really had ability along the way.
Well, she also had a reason for bouncing
around along the way too because she
Above: Mission Viejo Nadadores training facility.
couldn’t quite get a coach that would – I
don’t want to talk bad about her because
she’s a sweetheart. But I had to make
sure that when somebody comes to your
program, you’ve got to make sure that
they come there and understand what your
philosophy is and that you’re not going to
bend for anybody coming into your program.
At this particular point and it’s a little bit
erroneous but her mother had a great
reputation. That reputation was, oh my
God, you mean to tell me that your mother
might be involved as well. So, at this point,
I tried to desell the program. I simple said,
I brought her mother in and I said, “Hmm,
never met a girl that I couldn’t make cry. So,
I’m going to make this mother cry.”
And so, indeed I said, you know, we’re
really happy that actually Mark Schubert
who was actually gone at that time said
“You need to go to the Nadadores, this may
be your last shot but you need to go to the
Nadadores.” So I sat there and said, “You
know, I don’t need your daughter. I hear
she’s a real nice girl but I don’t necessarily
hear that you’re a very nice parent.”
“At this particular point, isn’t it great that
we’re in a position at the Mission Viejo
Nadadores that we don’t have to have any
particular swimmer? And so therefore, I
don’t need your daughter.” So with that in
mind, I’m going to set a few parameters
here. One, the fact is that your reputation
is one that you’re not much fun when
you’re on the pool deck.
So, you will never set foot on my pool deck.
This will be the first and last time that you
will be in this particular area. If you do, your
daughter is gone. If indeed I ever hear from
you, whether it be by email or by phone
or any other communication device, your
daughter is gone. I said in that case, we’re
gonna get along very, very well.”
The bottom line is, she cried. I couldn’t
believe it. She cried. So I said – I love this
statement too. I’ve seen it in the movies,
“Spare your tears because I’m not going
to react to your crying at this point but I’m
hoping that we have a nice, long, lasting
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
31
Operating a 1000 Member Swim Program
relationship. The meeting is over, goodbye.”
I swear to goodness, that particular time
and I think Coach Bill was in on that,
I’m not sure, one of my great coaches
here. He looked at me and went, “Oh
my God. What have you done?” Case
and point, she’s never been on our pool
deck, I’ve never heard from her and it’s
been the greatest relationship I’ve ever
had with a swimmer. I don’t know how
I came up with that particular story but
you’ll see her picture there. We’re very
happy to have her and she’s part of a
great program along the way.
You know I came there in 1992. One thing
you should know along the way is that things
change with all of our clubs. I talk to you
about the blank check era, what a wonderful
thing that he was involved with and it was
so great for him. But when I came there, it
was exactly almost within five days of the
fact that Mission Viejo Company handed
over the pool to now new City of Mission
Viejo. And said, “It’s yours. We have
nothing to do anymore. We’re built out
and we’re leaving. Goodbye.”
So at that particular point, I have a club
with no treasury because there was never
a treasury needed. There is no money.
And I had a club of 192 swimmers. The
one thing to learn by the way when you
are looking to go to a new club or being
hired at a new club, never ever follow an
icon. Mark Schubert left in 1985 and a
great coach took over for him.
He has proven himself even greater than
he was during the time he was with Mission
Viejo but he had no chance in the world
to succeed because you don’t follow an
icon. Whatever he did for five years was
not accepted and everything he did was
a great decision but it wasn’t accepted.
He could’ve been anybody. So along the
way, things didn’t necessarily go uphill if
you will for the Nanadores. And so when I
came, we had 192 people which is a fairly
large club nationally if you will but we also
had a situation where with 192 people
and a pool that we weren’t sure we were
going to be able to keep and no treasury.
I was dealt a hand of which, well, you
might as well consider this a brand new
club, and that we were going to have to
build and we were gonna have to create
some sort of business here.
32
(Continued)
The fact that I had been out of the sport for
10 years at that particular time, I came in
1992 and for the previous 10 years I was
a stockbroker with Dean Witter, and so I
had kind of kept my hand in it because my
wife actually was along the way at different
times, a coach with Mission Viejo back in
the great day, etcetera. But other than that,
when I came, I had been out for 10 years
and I said, okay what I’m gonna try to do
is create this as a business and build it as
a business and at the same time work on
the tradition of excellence that has been
achieved through the years.
I didn’t have really any coaches. My coach
was my wife, and there was a mass exodus
of coaches when they changed direction.
And there were a couple of coaches that
were still hanging around but really on
their way out that I talked back in to help
us out over the period of this transition and
certainly one was Tim Bauer who was with
me for one year who is now with Woodlands
in Texas and been there 18 years and he
did me a favor. He said, “I’ll stay with you
for a year.” I’ll just try to help you out but
I’ll always be in awe of the fact that he took
that chance. Ken Gray who is now also
with Woodlands and he also indeed took
that chance. I’ll always be able to meet my
favorite people along the way, believe me.
Philosophy, it kind of brings to me the fact
that, yes, I did coach before that 10-year
hiatus and yes, I was able to have some
very good swimmers along the way. And I
grew up through the ‘60s and ‘70s. I grew up
through that era that you went out and you
hammered. And the more you hammered,
the better they got and the better they got,
the more you hammered. And they just
kept getting better and better with a great,
great decade in the ‘70s.
Again, I keep looking at Debbie Meyer with
her great coaching. He was a crazy, crazy
individual, Sherm Chavoor, if any of you
remember him, but the fact is that we were
all crazy during that time, and the only thing
that we knew, we didn’t do a lot of technique,
we didn’t know a lot of what is right and what
is wrong. All we knew was the work ethic
and I’ll be using that term from time to time
during this talk, the work ethic. And so,
that’s what we did. We worked the crap out
of them, and they just kept getting better.
Then I left, I went on to be a stock broker
in the early ‘80s, from ‘81 to ‘92 and during
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
that time, things changed big time. Some
of you might have been around long
enough to understand what happened in
the ‘80s. The great swimmers of the ‘70s
were all – so many of them were distance
swimmers. Again, the Debbie Meyers, the
John Naber, in my case the Mike Bruners,
etcetera, they were all distance swimmers
and they were the heroes of the day.
But during the ‘80s, things started to change
and people started to ask how much further
can they go, where is the stopping point
here? Isn’t there a better way than to just
keep hammering them? And so there were
some tests that were done, and the results
of these tests or studies and so on came
out with the thought, you know, all that stuff
that they’re doing really is fluff and it’s really
not worth that much and we can get just as
much out of a lot less and we won’t have to
put in as much and God bless the results.
Well it turned out unfortunately that people
take things like that and overdo them. So,
in my philosophy anyway, the ‘80s changed
everybody’s minds as to what the work
ethic was all about. The work ethic became
what little can you do to get the most out of.
Indeed now, I think there are two camps and
I think that that’s filled around and I think
that fortunately the camp of, wait a minute,
work ethic does count.
So, when I first came on, I knew you either
way. I left when I was a pounder, and I came
back wanting to be a pounder. And the fact
was, they looked at me and said, “I beg your
pardon? This is the ‘90s. You haven’t even
been in here. You don’t know all these new
things. We can’t accept you.” We had an
exodus at 192, the first six months as not
192 after six months. And here I was, there
to build the club, not ruin the club.
But, along the way, the one thing that I
have been able to do and the only brag
I’ll give you all day is that I strive to stick
to what works along the way and what
has worked for me. I still believe in the
work ethic, and I try if I am going to do
anything with my staff, to make sure that
they believe in the work ethic.
Now that doesn’t mean that we’re back to
the ‘70s and pounding them day in and day
out, or that we’re looking at our age group
kids and pounding them day in and day out.
Believe me, quite the opposite. But at the
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American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
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34
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
www.arenaUSA.com
Operating a 1000 Member Swim Program
same time, what we’re trying to do along the
way is create that image that we’re willing to
work for what we get.
The fact is that I went the first two or three
years and God bless my wife and our age
group coaches because fortunately, what
I was losing at the top end, they were
getting at the bottom end. So ultimately,
the pendulum turned a little bit and we
started adding swimmers to the entire
program so that we could actually pay our
coaches. And after the first year and a
half or so, that 192 went back to 140 then
back up to 240 and then after I think two
or three years, two years, we hit the 300
mark. The idea was grow from the base,
because we have to pay our coaches and
we have to pay the rent.
So, we continued to do that and actually
continue to do that to this day. Now, our
mission statement is something that you’re
gonna see there. Don’t read it because it
will take you all day. That’s the longest,
most idiotic mission statement I have ever
read. In fact, in doing this talk, I said, I am
not going to read that. I can’t read that
statement, it’s too long. So, I think there are
(Continued)
63 words in that sentence. And what I did,
just playing with it this morning, I changed
it, and I’ll go ahead and read what I did this
morning because I got it down to 23 words,
and I’m going to continue to try to get it
down to 15 to 16 words.
But what I have here is, and I think this is
very important, it’s not one of those a-ha
moment so don’t write it down. The Mission
Viejo program is dedicated to providing
the opportunity to make a commitment to
the pursuit of excellence with the goal to
acquire life-lasting attributes. Bottom line is,
that says it all, I don’t need all the adjectives
and etcetera and the ands and the ors and
the what, just say it, get it out there. When
you have a mission statement, say what
you want and move on, let people know.
That’s all I have to say about that mission
statement, I’ll move on. Putting a staff
together that creates great people.
This is what it’s all about. I don’t care
if you have a staff of one, or a staff of,
in our case you’ll see here we have a
staff of 25, but it’s more important that
you create the good people on your staff
than anything else you can possibly do.
Fran, God bless his soul, not only swam for
us but I saw a good person. So I said, not
only are you gonna swim for us, by golly
you are going to coach our little kids. So we
put him to work and he was one of the most
amazing people I’ll ever know. But I had to
have him on the staff. I had to have him
share what he was all about. The coaches
that I have now, they’re handpicked; they’re
people that, without them we are nothing.
Please understand and I’m gonna bring this
up about five times because this is an a-ha
moment right now.
Make sure you remember that. If you do
nothing with your club, make sure that
you have a staff of good people, caring
people, passionate people, people who are
willing to put the team first and to – I need
junkies. I need swimming junkies out there.
Unfortunately that’s not a good family term,
is it? But it’s a fact that I need them to fall in
love with our sport and what it represents
and so on. God bless that whole situation,
I’ve surrounded myself with junkies, and
hopefully that they remain in that fashion
along the way. I don’t know if that’s a nice
thing I said or not.
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
35
Copyright © 2007- 2014 Russell Cox, CoachCox.co.uk. All Rights Reserved.
And they indeed are people that put the
team in front of themselves, because they’re
not rich, by the way. They would like to be
rich. Some of them asked me to be richer
along the way, but the fact is that they’re not
in it for the money because it’s not there.
But at the same time, they’re good people,
they’re passionate people and they want to
be in the sport.
Also, your staff has got to care more about
the constituents or the members than they
do themselves. This is something you’ve
got to understand. You can’t have coaches
out for themselves, and if they are, they
won’t last. There will be a stopping point
and you will lose them and maybe they’ll go
on to greater heights, etcetera. But from a
team concept, you’ve got to have people
that care more about the members than
themselves and their own attributes and
their own plots, etcetera.
You know, we work with the city of Mission
Viejo. A lot of you work with maybe recreation
departments, or school districts or whatever
you work with, but we’re at the behest of our
bosses, if you will, or the people that either
hire us, fire us or give us the direction of our
36
particular pools and so on. Well the city of
Mission Viejo, they’re not my boss, but they
control our facility. We rent or lease from
the city of Mission Viejo. And if that goes,
we’re in major guano, we’re in big trouble.
So, I’m out to make sure on a daily basis
that our reputation with the city is something
that we work on all the time.
Along the way, every year, every year, we
find out what can we do to help the city, to
make the city understand that we care about
them. I think it’s next week or the following
week that we have a citywide cleanup
project, where we go out and there’s a
certain area, it would be on the highway or
any place like that.
Quick story: when I got there, not only were
there 192 swimmers and they lost their icon
coach, etcetera, etcetera, and things were
not going in the right direction. The mayor
of the city at that particular time decided that
the pool really was not used properly and
therefore a skate park would be better and
that they could probably make the pool into
a skate park much easier than have to pay
for the renting of the pool.
A major portion of our club, our whole 13, 14
division, Adam Dusenberry’s division, gets
out there and just goes 8 hours of picking up
trash in certain areas of the city and making
sure that they wore the Nadadores colors
along the way. But they do it for nothing and
they do it and make a fun time out of it but
the city really notices that. Most cities and
most areas have a Relay For Life type of
thing for cancer; we make sure that every
year, not only from a donation part but from
a participation part, we make sure that we’re
out there all night long with their 24-hour
Relay For Life. And again, making sure that
our colors are out there and that indeed we
give and don’t expect to receive.
And so, that first year and a half was touch
and go. Not a lot of people knew that,
but we had to do everything we could to
sell ourselves to the city, the tradition of
excellence of the Nadadores and what they
meant and so on and ultimately had to work
with a long-term contract to make sure that
we had the pool for a period of time.
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
Let me say this now and I’ll say it again
as the talk goes along.
The most
important thing that we can do and that
you can do is to make sure that you give
to people, to swimmers, to cities, to any
particular entity, just give. Don’t give
with a hope or expectation of receiving
something back, because the best way
to get it back is exactly that. Give with no
expectations. You do that and ultimately
it comes back. You could do that in all
aspects of life, I can guarantee it.
Today, I was leaving and you know how
the maids do your room and stuff like that?
And all of a sudden I saw this little card
saying, I am Antonina or something and I
just cleaned your room, etcetera. I haven’t
done this before but all of a sudden I said,
Gees! Here’s a lady that probably works
for basically nothing and working whatever
number of hours a day. I’m going to leave
10 dollars, because I figured in this day
and age, 2 beers. So I’m going to give
up 2 beers for this lady and I was going to
leave it there. And the fact is, I’m never
going to see that lady, I’m not going to
hear from that lady, whatever. But what
is going to happen is she’s going to know
that the Mission Viejo Nadadores gave her
10 dollars. She’s going to know that.
Will I ever see any results from that? Never.
But maybe she’s going to tell somebody;
maybe she’s going to have that feeling
for somebody. It will come back, and if it
doesn’t it doesn’t. I missed out on two beers
though; I’m a little upset about that.
I got to find out what time it is. You’re
going to tell me when. I keep moving?
Faster? Okay. Honestly, how long do I
have? 20 minutes? Okay, we’ll move on
to the next here.
You know, when you have success, that’s
a great thing, what a deal. But what we
have to do along the way, when you have
success, just move on, just move on. It’s
a great thing. Happiness is, but moves on,
because unless you do, you’re going to live
off of that the rest of your life and maybe
that’s not enough to keep you going. Just
challenge yourself for more.
Create a culture. We heard the Ron and
Don Show yesterday, great, great talks.
Talk about character and all this good stuff.
The best thing that we do at the Nadadores
and the first thing that I saw and we have on
all of our stationery, etcetera, is a tradition of
excellence. Again, Mark Schubert earned
that. The club earned that back in the day.
My job is to take that and to enhance it to
the best of my ability. My job is to make sure
that our staff believes in that. My job is to
make sure that my staff makes sure that the
swimmers believe in that.
The swimmers need to take it to their parents
to make sure they believe in that, and
there’re so many ways to do it but one way
is, everybody can do it. They talked about it
yesterday. By golly, wear the uniform, wear
the colors. Be proud of your position, be
proud of your team. And anybody can do
that. A brand new team could do that. It
may not be noticed or accepted or whatever
over the first year or the second year or the
fifth year, but pretty soon, when we walk in
at swim meets and hopefully you agree with
me or some of you will, that’s the Mission
Viejo Nadadores, that’s their colors. They
are wearing their colors with pride. They’re
proud of their positions.
Do it with your team. A-ha moment, that’s
got to be one of them – it’s got to be one of
them, everybody and some of you already
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
37
Operating a 1000 Member Swim Program
(Continued)
do it. So, remind yourself, hey, we do this.
I have so many friends here from England
that come all the time and I make sure, and
if I haven’t, please tell them I did anyway. I
make sure that they’d leave with a T-shirt,
that they’d leave with something that has
Nadadores on it so when they go back to
England, somehow they’re going to be
selling the Nadadores, because they’re
happy they were there, they had a good
experience when they were there and
they go home and in England they see the
Nadadores along the way.
I’m not sure. I know it wasn’t Jack Bauerle
because it wasn’t about the Phillies. But,
just do something and understand that
today was fine but tomorrow if you don’t do
something better, today doesn’t matter. So,
realize that along the way.
and fight the issues or we can take the high
road as we say and take those issues and
say, all right, what can we learn from them?
What can we learn from what went wrong
today, and that way tomorrow, again, we’re
going to be better.
I hit Shift, is that a bad deal? By the
way, I didn’t do this. Again, that’s about
having good people and people that can
actually live in the 2000s, that’s why
I surround myself with these kinds of
people. They can do that.
When people come and visit your
program, give them something from your
program. Put it in your budget. Give them
something that they can take back to
remember the club by and ultimately sell
the club along the way. There are always
these little things that can be done.
High road, everyday we have issues.
I’m hoping that that’s the case out there
because I’m hoping that we’re not the
only club out here that everyday we have
an issue. The one thing about having
a club of 800 to a thousand people is
that we have unfortunately lots of issues
everyday. But everyday there are issues
that we all have to deal with whether we
have 80 on our team or 800.
Some of the issues mean that we’re going
to lose swimmers. In our area, you can
cross the street 4 different times and come
across 4 different teams and they’re all
good teams, all with different philosophies.
Remember I lost half my team the first 6
months to – okay I’m going to say it, the
Novas, the Irvine Novas, Dave Salo, one of
the best coaches in the country, the world,
but he was Dave Salo and selling his way.
And it’s a great way but it’s not my way. And
so, kids, many times would say, go there,
you better click, I don’t have to go far, don’t
have to–this work ethic thing and have to
deal with his philosophy as we go through,
good. I want to do that. And we lost a lot of
people, and that was an issue.
It says here we need to be better tomorrow
than we are today. That’s self-explanatory.
Everyday, you can do something great but
it’s not great tomorrow. I’m not sure who
it was. It might have been Eddie Reese,
How you handle those issues tells you
everything. We can take the negative part
But what can I learn from that? I learned
that, hey, if I just stick with my philosophy
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38
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
and continue to stay with it and to sell it
and believe it and work it, it will all work
itself out and it has. They still have a
great team. They have the great coach,
etcetera, etcetera but so do we and we
have it our way.
So, deal with the issues, take the high road
and don’t worry about losing swimmers. My
wife is the worst. She loses a swimmer and
we have a funeral. I say, forget the funeral,
move on to the wake, have a couple of
beers and have a good time and then go on.
That’s a lot of coaches, a lot of coaches
and a big program. But at the same time,
realize, well, you have one coach or 25,
it’s all about them. It’s so easy. This is the
biggest joke in the world. I have been the
developmental coach of the year, twice in
the last four or five years, bologna, I mean
I haven’t done anything. The people right
in the front row here are the people who
did the entire thing, development, I don’t
develop anybody, I take the cream of the
crop and I do what I can with them.
But all the developing is done by my
coaches, and I get to plot it. I don’t know
where that came from, but that’s a fact and
it’s one thing you all have to realize. You
are not as good as you think you are. Don’t
be looking at yourself in the mirror and
saying, “God, I’m great.” I heard that some
time today, we were supposed to do that,
but believe me, do everything I can to get
away from the mirror, my age. But the fact
is, realize that it’s the people that you have
around you that are going to make or break
you along the way, and we have 25 great
people to work with.
Feedback, we have meetings and we have
to simply because we have so many. But
we have a weekly meeting and during that
meeting, it’s usually a business meeting.
We have reports from the different divisions
that we have. By the way our divisions are
novice division, our swim school division,
our eight and under division, 10 and under
division, 11 and 12, 13, 14, senior, national
and international division. All of those have
directors, coaches, but directors we call
them. And under those directors or working
with those directors, we have a part-time
staff that each of them have.
So really we have maybe 8 to 10 teams of
about 100 people. So with that in mind,
what we’re trying to do is indeed take those
teams and give them the autonomy of
being those teams and letting them be the
best that they can be within that team or
division and put it all together as the Mission
Viejo Nadadores. So, we do have to have
meetings to make sure that all of that is kind
of working cohesively.
he ended up going as an assistant coach
to the University of Minnesota. And then,
was there for six or seven years and then
with Terry Neisner, became the head coach
of the women, and just recently, has moved
to be the head coach or program director of
both men and women.
But I learned something this – I didn’t learn
it, another a-ha moment for me. I love
it when we sit after the different talks and
sit and talk, and sit and just share and just
listen to one another, and to listen to what
they got out of it. I’ve learned a lot just by
saying to the entire staff we’re going to sit
there and every time we get together you’re
going to come up with two things that you
learned from whatever talk you went to, and
you’re going to share it with us and we’re
going to go from there, great meetings.
That’s one of the thrills of my lifetime, is
to take a 22-year-old kid at the time, bring
him into the fold and watch him develop
and become what he is today. One of the
greatest thrills of my coaching career, and
this is what I’m hoping for, again, the staff
along the way. I want them here 20, 30
years, that would be great. But if I lose
them and I lose them to a situation where
they’re moving on professionally and
getting what they want out of the sport
and out of the career, I’ve won, I’ve won.
So, if we lose them we lose them. I’ll do
everything I can to keep them but its okay
if they move on to greater things.
So, one of my favorite people said the
best thing that she’s done in the last 6
months is come here for the meetings,
not for the talks but for the meetings that
we’ve been able to share together. So,
wait a minute, why don’t we do that more
often at home? Why do we need to have
a weekly meeting going through the same
old stuff, etcetera and giving the same
reports, well, I mean we have to from time
to time but let’s do it every two weeks and
those off weeks, sit in a circle and talk,
and just share about swimming. Sit with
your peers, sit with your staff, enjoy one
another and learn from each other.
The other thing is micromanage, holy moley
I can’t micromanage. Can you imagine
me trying to deal with all that and get any
results? I can’t micromanage. I’ve got
to give autonomy; I’ve got to trust in the
people that I work with. I may try to guide
as to the major philosophy of what we’re
trying to do but believe me, we have all
kinds of personalities on my staff, all kinds.
And that’s a good thing, sometimes it’s
a challenging thing. But it’s a good thing;
they all have to believe in what they do and
create their own position.
I don’t know if Kelly Kramer is here, but Kelly
was one of the first coaches that I hired after
getting through that first troublesome year,
and he was with us for four years. And there
is the epitome of someone, if I just gave him
some rope, he indeed would climb to the
highest area. After four years, it was obvious
that he belonged in a college situation and
We need to be proud. We need to walk
the walk of the Mission Viejo Nadadores.
We have a statement and its right
above Fran Crippen’s memorial. Once
a Nadadore, always a Nadadore. We’d
live by that, and we were going to create
that and move on with that and hope that
every Nadadore that moves on through
life believes in that: once a Nadadore
always a Nadadore; we want to be proud.
We have a single site with 800 to a
thousand people swimming every summer,
May through August. Now, I heard about
from Todd Schmitz, man, a couple of a-ha
moments there for Sundays. Yeah, we
actually have room in our pool on Sunday
afternoons. We have some extra room on
Saturdays. Why are we using it? Because
we’re dying trying to get 800 people in and
affording a half hour period, whether we
have a good facility or not is a very difficult
thing. But we need to learn to use the facility
to the best of our ability along the way.
We also have to – again, back to the staff,
how can we use the staff to the best of our
ability? We have 13 full-time staff, 12 hourly
staff and indeed that’s what I said at the
beginning, God, we do? I don’t even realize
it on a daily basis and that’s a credit to them
because it runs itself. I left my team and this
is another thing you’ve got to understand,
you’ve got to be able to coach your kids and
bring them to the point where they are able
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
39
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American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
Operating a 1000 Member Swim Program
to live with you and live without you.
I left them and, effectively, I’ve got my whole
staff here; who’s going to coach my kids?
I said, “Well, here you go. Here are the
workouts, here are your times. There’s
going to be one staff member there, not for
you but to make sure the facility is open and
running and so on. You are going to do the
workouts on your own.” They tell me that
they’re doing them. They promised me that
they’re doing them.
(Continued)
Larsen, you can take care of yourself,
you’ve got some great, great coaches on
this staff, and do your own thing. Give
me a call every once in a while, say hello,
but I’m not going to be there for you. And
I planned that way before he went. And
so, that’s just my thought. Some coaches
love to go there and see their kids. We
have TV now. You can watch them on TV.
And here’s the communication thing, texting
is a wonderful thing. I text each and every
one of them after every workout and I
learned how to do it because I think coach
Brian here told me, you can text something,
“How was your workout? Good, bad,” and
then, instead of writing it all again, you just
hit some button on your iPhone and you
can text the same thing. It was great, I can’t
believe I’m doing all that stuff.
How am I doing? Five minutes, good. I’m
going to just really roll along here. You can
see the different programs that we deal with
and they’re all major programs. Whether
they’re a minor program for you, they are all
programs. You’ve got to deal with them and
deal with them fairly and equally. Now this
program, I told you before, it’s probably
the most important one we’ve got. It’s
the most important one we’ve got. I’ve
got to make sure that I deal with them to
the best of my ability and I need to do a
better job. It goes all the way through.
So now they all get to say that I care enough
to write them, I do care. So I’m getting
all these answers back and so on but at
least I’m communicating with them along
the way, but the moment I’m trying to tell
you here is, believe and work so that they
can be independent and so that they can
understand the program well enough to take
these times and use them to their benefit.
Our masters program, coach Mark, taking
the programs with about 30 people, now
he has over 210 or so, what a great deal,
very important part of our program. And oh
by the way, you people who don’t have a
master’s program, they love to spend. They
buy stuff and they also are great sponsors
along the way. Be good to them. Don’t
expect money back but be good to them.
The other thing too is – this is completely
off a thing, in fact I had Chloe Sutton and
Chad LaTourette and Christine Jennings
and Ashley Twitchell all went to the World
Championships this summer. I wasn’t on
the staff, I don’t know what happened about
that one by the way, but anyway I wasn’t on
the staff. My philosophy is, if I’m not on the
staff, I’m not on the staff, but I’m not going to
be a spectator.
We also need to take these things, set
goals, challenge them and indeed have
goals for ourselves along the way, just
goals that we’d like to do. We’ve been able
to put somebody on the Olympic team since
1976, every Olympic Games. I’m not sure
how many clubs can say that but I’m very
proud of that, and it was a difficult situation.
And by golly we’re going to put some
people on it this year as well and continue
with that tradition of excellence. But along
the way, we’re going to have goals for this
year and then we’re going to take them and
we’re going to do better next year, etcetera.
Goals are very important.
So I on purpose did not go to Shanghai
because I’m not going to be out there
because – being on the staffs that I’ve
been on, the most important thing I think
that swimmers need to do is to be able to
work with anybody and be able to progress
on through. They don’t need your coattails.
So, for the very reason that I didn’t want to
put the pressure on the swimmer and/or the
staff of the United States, I didn’t go. If I’m
not on the Olympics, I’m not going to go.
When Larsen Jensen, who I hope is
going to be here the next talk, when he
went to the Olympics in 2004, I didn’t go.
Male Speaker 1: if you’ve got you say a
thousand people, so a thousand swimmers,
how do you know from a thousand and
keep increasing the revenue where it does
not get included in that –
Bill Rose: Okay. We’re in that position
now. The question is how do you go
to a thousand and keep increasing the
revenue, etcetera and to grow from there,
do we grow from there? No. By golly it’s
impossible for us to grow. We have no
space. We either have to get satellites
or different pools or whatever and that’s
the decision that ultimately we’ll have to
make. If you really want to know, I don’t
want to grow anymore. I can hardly
handle what we’re doing right now.
Bill Rose’s brilliant career began at the
University of the Pacific (1968-1974) where
his team won two PCAA championships.
He then built the DeAnza Swim Club in
Cupertino, CA into the nation’s largest club
during his tenure (1974-1976).
And finally, with 4 minutes to go, thank
you very much. If you please, ask a few
questions that mean you actually were
listening or care. If anybody cares,
could you ask a question or two? I’ve got
to go back one over there. If you tell me
that I am not going back. Is that back
enough? Okay, please ask a question,
anybody, anybody, anybody? Question?
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
41
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American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
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American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2
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44
American Swimming I 2014 Edition Issue 2