Tips for
Coaches of Novice Swimmers
BY
JOHN LEONARD
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Coach
“face to face…” get down low and see the swimmers eyeball to
eyeball without them having to crank their head back to see you, or
staring at your belly button. Bend, sit, squat down, whatever gets you
eyeball to eyeball. Don’t be afraid to get up close and take up
their whole view so you have their complete attention, either.
-
People
repeat what they enjoy. You want them to repeat the “coming to
practice” mechanism. Make sure you end each practice with something
that sends them home smiling and happy. There is no point in having a
wonderfully detailed physiological training plan if swimmers aren’t
coming to practice regularly. Get attendance first, then train. You
can’t train people who don’t come to practice.
-
Technique
is everything. Spend your time doing strokework, drills and technique
work in all strokes. The senior coaches who later get “your kids”
will thank you for it. (or at least, they Should) You can incorporate
technique work into aerobic development work easily. Get the strokes
as fast as you, as soon as you can.
-
Corollary
to #3, is the developmental principle of “go as fast as you can on
as little volume and intensity as you can, for as long as you can.”
That means that swimmers with good technique will swim fast. Keep the
training levels low as long as the swimmer is “progressing” at an
acceptable rate to themselves, (and their parents, in some cases.) Any
coach can make an age grouper swim faster by increasing training
volume or training intensity. But is you are going 12,000 a day at age
12, how much will you have to do daily to swim well at 17? At 24?
Don't make training the ONLY way to go faster. On
the recommended side… gradually increase volume and intensity over a
period of years, not months or days. Increase systematically.
-
When
you correct, correct the action, not the person. Use “Billy, you
need to do flip turns at every wall, no open turns, please.” Rather
than “Billy, don’t be lazy! Every turn a flip turn.”
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