It was another great year for US in the Olympics. We came one medal shy of our medal count from the last Olympics, but we took away four more gold medals than the last.
The Olympics is an exciting time for swimming, as it is our showcase event that only takes place every four years. So many watch, and so many of our young athletes watch.
I get questions every time though about the Olympic swimmers swimming. Yes they look amazing flying through the water, but the kids pick up on their other techniques as well, and begin to question and possibly try out. Oh, how this is hard to deal with sometimes.
Our Olympic swimmers don't swim text book strokes. Many of them have alterations to their strokes that they have developed to take advantage of something about their bodies and their ability. Young swimmers learn the rules, the basic strokes, how to swim more text book. As they progress, coaches will look for advantages for what their body has to offer, to be able to go that little extra bit. Swimmers should not emulate these techniques, as they are trained for that particular swimmer.
I got the question about why the Olympians breathe on one side (of course not all of them do), and I had to explained that as they developed they realized that they were dependent on one arm for maximum force, and that they sacrificed a little on their weaker side to take advantage of their powerful side. This is not something a young swimmer should do. We develop the balance stroke, to learn all the proper techniques that best learned balanced. Then as they go into specialization (girls around 16 - 19, and boys around 17 - 20) they will take all that they learned about proper technique and tweak it to try to maximize their stroke with what their body make-up is (as not every person has the exact same body).
Coaches, we have some fun times trying to not get our swimmers to swim these altered strokes. Good Luck. Swimmers, be patient, master the basics and the rules before you start breaking them. Parents, (I reiterate) don't coach you kids, and that includes comparing your kids strokes to Olympians or that fast kid from another team. Kids grow at different rates and bodies are different. You can't develop fast swimmers based primarily off emulation.
Coach Kacy, Hello again! I watched the Olympics as well...but my thoughts were slightly different! I watch Mr. Phelps, and think " hmmm ..here is a classic example of a great athlete who could have been much faster!!!!!" I do not accept the many excuses for poor or less than desired technique!!! How many awful race finishes did you see? The gal from the Netherlands(GOLD!!!!) took an extra stroke AND almost knocked her teeth out!!!! Shocking!!!! I think EVERY SWIMMER is an age-grouper...and needs to PRACTICE TECHNIQUE EVERY DAY!!!! The coach can't hold back on corrections just because the athlete is exceptional!!!! Best wishes and keep up the GREAT work Kacy, mitch ivey
ReplyDeleteI agree with your thoughts. I also appreciate the comment, as I don't get that many. I think I was trying to get across the part of explaining to the swimmers who are watching these amazing athletes who break rules that we instill in them. I think through my blog I was trying to justify how they swim, but reinforcing the importance of still sticking to the rules (the most recent observation from one of my athletes is, why do they breathe on one side?)
ReplyDeleteI love to see that you press technique so much, as I wonder sometimes if I do too much. No matter how many times I try to scale back, but I always go back to teaching technique though.