Confessions of a Swim Coach.... - Page 2

Pico and ME · 03-09-2009, 01:05 PM

Monster, you're lucky to have come across this opportunity...it will benefit you and the kids. Im envious.

monster · 03-10-2009, 05:16 PM

Breaststroke today. TWO hand touch, no flip turns!

We also did some medley relays which they seemed to enjoy. Thursday will be tricky -Butterfly, which only a few of them already know..... first meet next Friday, already working on our line up.....

monster · 03-16-2009, 09:18 PM

OOOOh, I'm all excited... just submitted the entries for the Friday meet -had to do it all properly using Team Manager Software.... both of our other swim teams are so small that we only usually have to do this for the end of season championships, so it's the first time I've used it.

anyhoo, it was fun to learn and pretty nifty -I made our winter team buy Meet Manager for next year -too many other teams want to go the electronic route and are starting to get pissy with us for being all paper oriented, so i'm glad i've lost my cherry in that area.

The good news for us is... We may actually stand a chance of being pretty awesome! We are a tiny Middle School as we are part of a k-8 school, so have only 150 middle school kids, compared to 600 average. But our kids get swimming class every week from kindergarten -other kids only start swim class in 6th grade. And swimming is a sport that fits well with our philosophy of co-operative learning -working together to help each other improve their own skills rather than just being out to be better than the others.

So, we have a team of 19 kids who can really swim and love it. We heard that another middle school has 22 kids (out of 550) and most of them are newbs, on the team becuase their parents view it as free swim lessons. I'm sad that these kids are only coming to swimming in 6th grade and obly doing it because it's free, but I'm also optimistic for our team because they always get beaten at these IM sports things basically because they're outnumbered. Here, they have a chance of representing their school. doing well and feeling good. we aren't going to win, but for once, we may not be distant last. and we have enough swimmers in each event that being outnumbered should not be an issue.

I still wish all kids got swim class from kindergarten, though. I had all my kids in the pool by 6 months, and before that, we did deep baths with controlled submersion. I was terrified of them drowning either by not being able to swim of being scared of the water and panicking.

We have no 8th-grader on the team, but a couple of 5th graders are "swimming up". we may be the youngest team to. we'll still rock, though. and we have bright orange caps with pandas on them

monster · 03-18-2009, 10:30 PM

Well fucking damn it and a lot of other bad words.....

I got the heat sheets for Friday's meet and our swimmers have been screwed because we gave honest seed times. We contemplated a little "tweaking" but decided against, bacuase the events are "beginner" events, so we figured we should go the "beginner" route. The other teams didn't do a "little tweaking" either -they did a whole shitload!

I have kids who swim year round and I marshall all the meets and all the championships and write up the results...so I know many of the swimmers on the other teams. Not to say hi to so much, but I know how fast they can swim. There are kids who my daughter could lap in a 100 (4 lengths) ranked above her for thos meet.....with times so ridiculous that if they were true, the kids would be receiveing lucrative scholarships to olympic swim camp.

OK, so our swimmers will probably win their heats. that's nice... but the real aim (especially as our swimmers are so young and competing against kids up to 4 years older) is to beat your own personal best. That's hard to do if you win your heat easily and there's no-one at your shoulder bringing it on...

ZenGum · 03-18-2009, 10:37 PM

Why the #$%@ do people cheat at amateur kids sport????

They are sooo doing it totally and utterly #$%@ing WRONG.

BTW learning to swim is pretty much a default part of childhood here. (Skiing and blizzard survival skills, not so much...). We had a pool at our school, and also got private multi-week courses every summer holiday, and we were by no means rich or unusual in this.

But then, Aussies are beach crazy surf-gods who would rather swim than root.

monster · 03-20-2009, 11:13 PM

So... the kids I knew had BS seed times swam way slower than their seeds, so I wasn't hallucinating (and so did their team-mates in the main), but maybe 50% of the times were within 15%, so it wasn't so bad, as it turned out.

In the events where all our swimmers ended up in the slowest two heats, we blew everyone else out of the water and came away with all our swimmers finishing way before anyone else. Not a real race for them, but it was at the beginning of the meet, so i think it helped to bolster their spirits, because we are always lame duck team in the other sports andmany of them have never competed before. Karma I reckon. Good things come from being screwed

Side note on the lame duck thing... We're a public k-8 magnet school with an alternative program. We're the "hippy school" we're into co-operative rather than competitive learning, and are all about personal improvement rather than being top of the class. This attitude, obviously, is not as effective in a sporting environment. Plus we only have 150 middle school kids and a no exclusion policy, compared to the other schools who have 600 to choose from and are happy to pick an elite team and send the rest away. we just don't work that way. So we lose a lot. It's OK, we're good losers.

But swimming is the perfect sport for us and our philosophy, because it's a team thing, but to benefit the team, you do the best you can and aim to improve on your time and don't worry about anyone else. So you can be competitive and hippy at the same time.

Anyhoo... the Pandas Rocked today. all 19 showed up (we started with 15 and got up to 19, it usually works the other way with sports at our school) many of them had never competed before and were a little nervous about knowing when their races would be and what they needed to do, but once the medley relays were over (a logistical nightmare for us) they realized we knew our stuff and would get them where they needed to be on time.

We made them wear team caps. Only one other team had a team cap and only a few swimmers wore it. Ours really stood out in the pool (which helps when you're seriously outnumbered) It turned out that this helped with the team spirit -they loved that they all had the same caps, and I think the parents loved it too, because we asked for donations, but all swimmers got one regardless. after the meet, parents were falling over themselves to pay for the caps.

No team scores were kept, so we made our own, just to see... and basically the 6 Middle schools are in two leagues of 3. Those who score 550 points average and those who are more around the 100 mark. We hit the latter 3 - but in the middle. The school below us is the school my children should attend and the most "impoverished" school in the area. they get some awesome swimmers because they are the local school for the kids who swim at our sumer pool, but they also get a load of kids who can't swim at all and whose parents view swim team as free lessons. The other school is the biggest of the six middle schools, have 48more kids tan we do and ar in an afluent area. So to get half the ponts they did is very heartwarming.

But most importantly, Our Pandas were AWESOME. no-one got too scared, they all stepped up and did their best and almost everyone bettered their seed time -and that's what we asked of them.

this is them at warm-up

monster · 04-06-2009, 09:28 PM

OK, I have the heat sheets for the second and final meet. What a difference! we have swimmers seeded in the top heats for two events and the second-fastest for many more. And they're not made-up times We've been a little bolder and the other teams have been much more realistic.

We're also being a little more mercenary. One of the top heat seeds is my daughter in the 25 free. This is for 6th grade only, and -we presumed- aimed for the 6th-graders who can barely swim. so that's who we put in it last time -our 6 slowest 6th graders. The event was won in 14 seconds by a State level USA swimmer. So, this time, no prisoners. Hebe is 6th grade, but she's actually up a grade and is tiny. She is a USA swimmer, but not at State Championship level, so it's a fair play, we reckon. (In regular competitive swimming, you stop swimmming 25yards when you turn 9, so she's excited/amused to be doing a 25 after 2.5 years away from it!)

Also, last meet, we started planning our entries by putting whoever could fly/IM in those events -the meet was so soon after the start of the season that we had to rely on swimmers who already knew butterfly for those events. now we've had time to teach the fly properly, we have several new swimmers willing to swim those events, releasing our seasoned swimmers to swim what they're best at. In Hebe's case this is breaststroke.

Wish us luck for tomorrow....

unfortunatley, we just got word that one of our swimmers has the painters and decorators in and is scared of mice, so we have to completely redo our relays (she's "B" relay and we go through E.)

Pie · 04-06-2009, 09:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by monster

...we just got word that one of our swimmers has the painters and decorators in and is scared of mice...

Good luck!

ZenGum · 04-06-2009, 09:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by monster

Wish us luck for tomorrow....

unfortunatley, we just got word that one of our swimmers has the painters and decorators in and is scared of mice, so we have to completely redo our relays (she's "B" relay and we go through E.)

Good luck for the meet, but can you explain that last bit some more? WTF does decorating and mice have to do with swimming relays?

monster · 04-06-2009, 10:02 PM

it's a female swimmer thing (didn't you get Bend It Like Beckham over there?)

monster · 04-06-2009, 10:07 PM

Our swimmers are 11-14. 2/3 are girls. They have strange new stuff happening to their bodies. Girls who have been competitive swimmers before they "became women" know without a doubt that they'll get their first period on the dawn of a championship meet and will have to quickly make friends with Mr. Tampax. Girls for whom competitive awimming is also new are apparently blissfully unaware that you cannot wear pads in the pool.

ZenGum · 04-06-2009, 10:08 PM

Ohh, hang on, now I think I'm getting it ...

[/slow]

monster · 04-10-2009, 10:29 PM

Well the end of season rocked. We did even better at the second meet, several of the teachers turned up in their own time to watch and the swimmers did great.

The female swimmer with the problem was really sad not to swim, so we made her assistant coach and she was all happy again. The boys didn't know not to ask why (too young), but she handled it well and with dignity.

The swimmers rocked, the end of season pizza party and paper plate awards went down well yesterday, but the best thing was hearing from a parent at another school who I know from other swim teams (and who is generally a real bitch) that she was sat in the stand commenting on the fact that we have a team for the first time and (I'm interpreting here) what a shame that parents have to coach it..... and then a mother in front of her turned round and said to her "that's the team my daughter's on and this has been the best thing ever. Those parents decided we need a swim team and stepped up to coach it and did a great job. that's what our school is all about and we're so proud to be part of it".

I felt a fraud at the start, but now I don't. I may not be the next olympic swim coach, but I know enough to help some middle school kids who've never competed before become better swimmers, and I care enough to make something happen that was missing before. That's pretty cool, even though i say so myslef. we're gonna do it all over again -only bigger- next year.

Clodfobble · 04-11-2009, 12:25 AM

Seems like the season went by so fast! Is there any sort of summer program?

monster · 04-12-2009, 10:51 PM

not for the school, but plenty in the area and we made sure the swimmers knew about them....especially ours

03-10-2009, 05:16 PM	#17
monster I hear them call the tide Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Perpetual Chaos Posts: 30,852	Breaststroke today. TWO hand touch, no flip turns! We also did some medley relays which they seemed to enjoy. Thursday will be tricky -Butterfly, which only a few of them already know..... first meet next Friday, already working on our line up..... __________________ The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity Amelia Earhart

03-16-2009, 09:18 PM	#18
monster I hear them call the tide Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Perpetual Chaos Posts: 30,852	OOOOh, I'm all excited... just submitted the entries for the Friday meet -had to do it all properly using Team Manager Software.... both of our other swim teams are so small that we only usually have to do this for the end of season championships, so it's the first time I've used it. anyhoo, it was fun to learn and pretty nifty -I made our winter team buy Meet Manager for next year -too many other teams want to go the electronic route and are starting to get pissy with us for being all paper oriented, so i'm glad i've lost my cherry in that area. The good news for us is... We may actually stand a chance of being pretty awesome! We are a tiny Middle School as we are part of a k-8 school, so have only 150 middle school kids, compared to 600 average. But our kids get swimming class every week from kindergarten -other kids only start swim class in 6th grade. And swimming is a sport that fits well with our philosophy of co-operative learning -working together to help each other improve their own skills rather than just being out to be better than the others. So, we have a team of 19 kids who can really swim and love it. We heard that another middle school has 22 kids (out of 550) and most of them are newbs, on the team becuase their parents view it as free swim lessons. I'm sad that these kids are only coming to swimming in 6th grade and obly doing it because it's free, but I'm also optimistic for our team because they always get beaten at these IM sports things basically because they're outnumbered. Here, they have a chance of representing their school. doing well and feeling good. we aren't going to win, but for once, we may not be distant last. and we have enough swimmers in each event that being outnumbered should not be an issue. I still wish all kids got swim class from kindergarten, though. I had all my kids in the pool by 6 months, and before that, we did deep baths with controlled submersion. I was terrified of them drowning either by not being able to swim of being scared of the water and panicking. We have no 8th-grader on the team, but a couple of 5th graders are "swimming up". we may be the youngest team to. we'll still rock, though. and we have bright orange caps with pandas on them __________________ The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity Amelia Earhart

03-18-2009, 10:30 PM	#19
monster I hear them call the tide Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Perpetual Chaos Posts: 30,852	Well fucking damn it and a lot of other bad words..... I got the heat sheets for Friday's meet and our swimmers have been screwed because we gave honest seed times. We contemplated a little "tweaking" but decided against, bacuase the events are "beginner" events, so we figured we should go the "beginner" route. The other teams didn't do a "little tweaking" either -they did a whole shitload! I have kids who swim year round and I marshall all the meets and all the championships and write up the results...so I know many of the swimmers on the other teams. Not to say hi to so much, but I know how fast they can swim. There are kids who my daughter could lap in a 100 (4 lengths) ranked above her for thos meet.....with times so ridiculous that if they were true, the kids would be receiveing lucrative scholarships to olympic swim camp. OK, so our swimmers will probably win their heats. that's nice... but the real aim (especially as our swimmers are so young and competing against kids up to 4 years older) is to beat your own personal best. That's hard to do if you win your heat easily and there's no-one at your shoulder bringing it on... __________________ The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity Amelia Earhart

03-18-2009, 10:37 PM	#20
ZenGum Doctor Wtf Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: Badelaide, Baustralia Posts: 12,861	Why the #$%@ do people cheat at amateur kids sport???? They are sooo doing it totally and utterly #$%@ing WRONG. BTW learning to swim is pretty much a default part of childhood here. (Skiing and blizzard survival skills, not so much...). We had a pool at our school, and also got private multi-week courses every summer holiday, and we were by no means rich or unusual in this. But then, Aussies are beach crazy surf-gods who would rather swim than root. __________________ Shut up and hug. MoreThanPretty, Nov 5, 2008. Just because I'm nominally polite, does not make me a pussy. Sundae Girl.

03-20-2009, 11:13 PM	#21
monster I hear them call the tide Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Perpetual Chaos Posts: 30,852	So... the kids I knew had BS seed times swam way slower than their seeds, so I wasn't hallucinating (and so did their team-mates in the main), but maybe 50% of the times were within 15%, so it wasn't so bad, as it turned out. In the events where all our swimmers ended up in the slowest two heats, we blew everyone else out of the water and came away with all our swimmers finishing way before anyone else. Not a real race for them, but it was at the beginning of the meet, so i think it helped to bolster their spirits, because we are always lame duck team in the other sports andmany of them have never competed before. Karma I reckon. Good things come from being screwed Side note on the lame duck thing... We're a public k-8 magnet school with an alternative program. We're the "hippy school" we're into co-operative rather than competitive learning, and are all about personal improvement rather than being top of the class. This attitude, obviously, is not as effective in a sporting environment. Plus we only have 150 middle school kids and a no exclusion policy, compared to the other schools who have 600 to choose from and are happy to pick an elite team and send the rest away. we just don't work that way. So we lose a lot. It's OK, we're good losers. But swimming is the perfect sport for us and our philosophy, because it's a team thing, but to benefit the team, you do the best you can and aim to improve on your time and don't worry about anyone else. So you can be competitive and hippy at the same time. Anyhoo... the Pandas Rocked today. all 19 showed up (we started with 15 and got up to 19, it usually works the other way with sports at our school) many of them had never competed before and were a little nervous about knowing when their races would be and what they needed to do, but once the medley relays were over (a logistical nightmare for us) they realized we knew our stuff and would get them where they needed to be on time. We made them wear team caps. Only one other team had a team cap and only a few swimmers wore it. Ours really stood out in the pool (which helps when you're seriously outnumbered) It turned out that this helped with the team spirit -they loved that they all had the same caps, and I think the parents loved it too, because we asked for donations, but all swimmers got one regardless. after the meet, parents were falling over themselves to pay for the caps. No team scores were kept, so we made our own, just to see... and basically the 6 Middle schools are in two leagues of 3. Those who score 550 points average and those who are more around the 100 mark. We hit the latter 3 - but in the middle. The school below us is the school my children should attend and the most "impoverished" school in the area. they get some awesome swimmers because they are the local school for the kids who swim at our sumer pool, but they also get a load of kids who can't swim at all and whose parents view swim team as free lessons. The other school is the biggest of the six middle schools, have 48more kids tan we do and ar in an afluent area. So to get half the ponts they did is very heartwarming. But most importantly, Our Pandas were AWESOME. no-one got too scared, they all stepped up and did their best and almost everyone bettered their seed time -and that's what we asked of them. this is them at warm-up Attached Images __________________ The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity Amelia Earhart

03-09-2009, 01:05 PM	#16
Pico and ME Are you knock-kneed? Join Date: Jul 2008 Location: Middle Hoosierland Posts: 3,549	Monster, you're lucky to have come across this opportunity...it will benefit you and the kids. Im envious.

04-06-2009, 09:28 PM	#22
monster I hear them call the tide Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Perpetual Chaos Posts: 30,852	OK, I have the heat sheets for the second and final meet. What a difference! we have swimmers seeded in the top heats for two events and the second-fastest for many more. And they're not made-up times We've been a little bolder and the other teams have been much more realistic. We're also being a little more mercenary. One of the top heat seeds is my daughter in the 25 free. This is for 6th grade only, and -we presumed- aimed for the 6th-graders who can barely swim. so that's who we put in it last time -our 6 slowest 6th graders. The event was won in 14 seconds by a State level USA swimmer. So, this time, no prisoners. Hebe is 6th grade, but she's actually up a grade and is tiny. She is a USA swimmer, but not at State Championship level, so it's a fair play, we reckon. (In regular competitive swimming, you stop swimmming 25yards when you turn 9, so she's excited/amused to be doing a 25 after 2.5 years away from it!) Also, last meet, we started planning our entries by putting whoever could fly/IM in those events -the meet was so soon after the start of the season that we had to rely on swimmers who already knew butterfly for those events. now we've had time to teach the fly properly, we have several new swimmers willing to swim those events, releasing our seasoned swimmers to swim what they're best at. In Hebe's case this is breaststroke. Wish us luck for tomorrow.... unfortunatley, we just got word that one of our swimmers has the painters and decorators in and is scared of mice, so we have to completely redo our relays (she's "B" relay and we go through E.) __________________ The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity Amelia Earhart

04-06-2009, 10:02 PM	#25
monster I hear them call the tide Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Perpetual Chaos Posts: 30,852	it's a female swimmer thing (didn't you get Bend It Like Beckham over there?) __________________ The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity Amelia Earhart

04-06-2009, 10:07 PM	#26
monster I hear them call the tide Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Perpetual Chaos Posts: 30,852	Our swimmers are 11-14. 2/3 are girls. They have strange new stuff happening to their bodies. Girls who have been competitive swimmers before they "became women" know without a doubt that they'll get their first period on the dawn of a championship meet and will have to quickly make friends with Mr. Tampax. Girls for whom competitive awimming is also new are apparently blissfully unaware that you cannot wear pads in the pool. __________________ The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity Amelia Earhart

04-06-2009, 10:08 PM	#27
ZenGum Doctor Wtf Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: Badelaide, Baustralia Posts: 12,861	Ohh, hang on, now I think I'm getting it ... [/slow] __________________ Shut up and hug. MoreThanPretty, Nov 5, 2008. Just because I'm nominally polite, does not make me a pussy. Sundae Girl.

04-10-2009, 10:29 PM	#28
monster I hear them call the tide Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Perpetual Chaos Posts: 30,852	Well the end of season rocked. We did even better at the second meet, several of the teachers turned up in their own time to watch and the swimmers did great. The female swimmer with the problem was really sad not to swim, so we made her assistant coach and she was all happy again. The boys didn't know not to ask why (too young), but she handled it well and with dignity. The swimmers rocked, the end of season pizza party and paper plate awards went down well yesterday, but the best thing was hearing from a parent at another school who I know from other swim teams (and who is generally a real bitch) that she was sat in the stand commenting on the fact that we have a team for the first time and (I'm interpreting here) what a shame that parents have to coach it..... and then a mother in front of her turned round and said to her "that's the team my daughter's on and this has been the best thing ever. Those parents decided we need a swim team and stepped up to coach it and did a great job. that's what our school is all about and we're so proud to be part of it". I felt a fraud at the start, but now I don't. I may not be the next olympic swim coach, but I know enough to help some middle school kids who've never competed before become better swimmers, and I care enough to make something happen that was missing before. That's pretty cool, even though i say so myslef. we're gonna do it all over again -only bigger- next year. __________________ The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity Amelia Earhart

04-11-2009, 12:25 AM	#29
Clodfobble UNDER CONDITIONAL MITIGATION Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Austin, TX Posts: 20,012	Seems like the season went by so fast! Is there any sort of summer program? __________________ My book My other book My spirit animal

04-12-2009, 10:51 PM	#30
monster I hear them call the tide Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Perpetual Chaos Posts: 30,852	not for the school, but plenty in the area and we made sure the swimmers knew about them....especially ours __________________ The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity Amelia Earhart

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