Competitive Swimmer

Join us!

2024 CS Swim Camp

Riverside Swim Stadium (65 meters)

We will sell out, so

please register soon!

Also Dr. Colleen Liaga, a top physical therapist

runs our specialized dryland

as part of SwmGym.

Michael Friederang, M.S. runs underwater video, tracking and even drone video

Last Camp US Record holder David Johnston and USC swimmer Mackie Hodges stepped in as will other swimmers and coaches this year. (We’re actually hoping David comes to camp speaking French!

Swimmunicators

Underwater video analysis 3 x a day!

SwimGym choice of

400 exercises

Great work; great play too!

Swag!

www.csswimcamp.com

800.999.0824

11

Mental Toughness with Dr. G

Contents

Free at Last!

USA Swimming showing comparative improvement for 400,000 swimmers

It’s (now) about time!! :)

Jump on In.

Is this a revolution?

January 2024

THIS IS (ALMOST) A RENNESAINCE

IN USA SWIMMING

Pay attention. YES. This is revolutionary. We have not known the improvement rate of USA Swimmers... even our NGB hasn’t known. until now(almost). We haven’t been able to tell the difference between luck and talent and the real fitness and stroke improvement of our swimmers. Now we (almost) can. Now it will be public(not quite). And now it possible for all American coaches to race to the top, helping one another to compete with other countries that are doing the same. And every swimmer can benefit, not just a few we track who are or might be Olympians, but everyone. You’ll see. We hope.

what's the benefit of information?

2. A coach can point out to his support group or athletic director that spending a budget a certain way is more likely to get the team to its potential based on the real data of the top 50 teams similar to theirs.

3. A coach might even use more than anecdotes to convince swimmers attendance is important or homework, or sleep, diet, kicking times, improve stroke counts, etc.

1. Foundational to creative coaching are the outcomes of teaching and training. Having the percentage improvement and fitness rates, growth and attrition, and more allows us to try new ideas and to know if we are winning what matters most to us.

And there’s more. Kate Douglass age group coach had a Swimmunicator on her every practice for years. Right now that’s an anecdote. Carle thinks it’s essential. Mark Schubert had Steve Friederang come in and video his Olympic Prep group and work with them one on one. Again, some think that’s a nice service. Schubert thinks it’s essential. Salo thinks short intense training is all you need. Troy swears by 20x400's and racing everything. Many college coaches swear by hypertrophy and general strength.

And we only hear from the coaches who are blessed with champion swimmers. There are 20,000 other creative American coaches.

4. A team can track it’s own success in 100 dolphin kick, for example, or 3 x 100's, etc. and relate that improvement to National norms and to other teams like their own or any swimmer in the world. With National data, coaches can adapt quickly, inspire swimmers to do the hard or tedious things they might not like as much for the greater good of improving their chances to reach their dreams and goals.

Future issues of CS magazine will show you how to use National data to make better choices of what to train and measure and how to help inspire swimmers by “racing” for lower stroke counts, faster underwaters, more specific flexibility and strength exercises, more measured training sets, etc.

Real Vrs Anecdote

Anecdotes are wonderful. Who doesn’t love a good story? Stories range from how a swimmer never went more than 50 meters fly in practice or others who went 8K a practice for two years. They are fun and heroic sometimes. It makes more sense though to measure the actual average percentage of improvement of swimmers in any given milieu at different stages of development. Success might be more due to the personality of the coach or team. It might be more due to a particular dryland program or swimming more long course, etc. Until now we have been throwing darts in the dark. Real data will shed a lot more light. Showing how much the average swimmer on your team at any level, and age, and number of years of experience is improving and how fit they are has the potential to help everyone, with any mission.

January 2024

THIS IS (ALMOST) A RENaiSsAnce

Of course people can still conclude wrongly or choose to read results errantly. Or one team’s ideas just might simply not be as effective for every or any other team.

But coaches will be able to tell when their choices are working or not. Creativity can soar as coaches and swimmers experiment with accountability. If 1,000 of the teams whose thirteen-year-olds go on to swim in college do doubles it might be a good idea to do doubles. If swimmers rate of improvement is less or greater once they start a heavy weight program we might choose to follow. If one part of the energy spectrum or one team event is weak, we might see that much sooner. Maybe measuring USRPT more accurately than with a stopwatch will work better.

When I first did this with the world top 100 swimmers in the 1990's, we could tell China was cheating with data before they admitted the East German coaches were drugging their athletes. Data might save us from getting beat by smaller population bases who are working together and have a better idea of our improvement and drop-off rates than we do. Wake up call: the Aussies want to beat American swimmers! They have been more unified at this than American coaches. In fact 98% of our coaches haven’t even been in the race to improve more than last year! 98% don’t even know the time for all their swimmers in dolphin kick or view strokes underwater. But now, with USA Swimming’s help, we can race for improvement with a flick of a mouse or thumb. BUT THEY AREN’T THERE YET AS YOU’LL SEE IN THIS ZOOM INTERVIEW. JOEL AND COREY GET IT, BUT SO FAR THEY WON’T GIVE IT ALL.

They say they are working on it. I believe them. But I’ve been asking for this for over thirty years. They are making sure we will compare the right things. I think we all get that. But, I think most of us are adults and college educated. Just give us the numbers -- then help us get to the next important dependent step -- the WHY and the HOW teams that excel the norms do so.

Right now though, you can, and you should use your own team’s data for improvement and compare it to the National norms. That's cool, useful, and you should start there. You should plan your training based up on race you can win, the race to improve times and fitness drop off rates. If you want to use data to inspire and improve within your team, keep in touch. I’ve been working on this for a long time. Our subscribers get updated interactive personal Goal Cards, postable tracking sheets, Stroke Report Cards, lane holders for GoPro and any other underwater cameras, 131 of my swim inventions, links to analysis software, and even help organizing and budgeting around their team missions.

And please congratulate, thank, DEMAND AND INSPIRE MORE FROM USA Swimming. They are paying some attention to you, us; not just to the national team members. And, that is a revolution. Ask them to use this data to help you find the most effective staff members when you’re ready to hire and to show how effective you have been when you’re ready to interview. Ask them to connect you with someone who can help you assess your underwater video. If Olympic Coach Mark Schubert needs it, so do the rest of us. If you want test sets that really work, ask USA Swimming to connect you with coaches in the top 5% of improvement of ALL their swimmers, not just those who coach record holders.

January 2024

Head in the sand vrs. passion for excellence

There are always coaches who will dismiss accountability. Not everyone is in this to help swimmers improve to their best. That’s not horrible. Some people just wanna have fun. Just show up and enjoy watching kids swim laps or have fun at meets, etc.

That’s actually instructional to coaches who are so serious they forget that data can and should enhance fun. Here’s how I tell it to swimmers who come to me for one-on-one improvement:

Imagine there are two swimmers, perfectly matched. They are doing a kick set. Both go 1:30 for 100 flutter kick with a board. One is paying attention to her times. One hates kicking and pulls into the walls, stop early and never looks at the clock --just hoping the set ends soon.

Who is having the most fun? How different might their finishes to their 100 or 200 events be a month later? Who feels a sense of accomplishment?

Coaches are the same way. If you are paying attention to how your swimmers are progressing compared to mine, your practices will be more purposeful and creative. You’ll discover more and you yourself will have more fun solving the riddle of making swimming faster fun.

And let’s take this to the international level. If you’ve seen them interviewed, you can see certain coaches from certain countries are simply having a great time! NGB’s who know how the bottom third of their swimmers are improving have an advantage over those who are just basking in the talent given them by coaches who are accountable day ofter day. That was USA Swimming. I know. I stood before them decades ago and challenged them to tell me the improvement rates of American swimmers ranked in the top 100 in the world. They didn’t know. They didn’t care. They cared about winning, and took care of those with the talent to win medals. You can have both rising tides of improvement and preparation for medals. A reasoble person would say one is connected to the other!

Now, I see that tide rising a little. And it could really accelerate.

This new tool is already helpful even when just use on your own team. It’s even better if you are under the national norm. If you are ahead the risk is that you will rest at the wall. The fun is out there in pool, racing to be better every day.

I’m committed to help. Happy new year!!

Steve Friederang

Competitive Swimmer Magazine

It’s Here!

Finally American teams can race for improvement and fitness!

You and USA Swimming have heard me whining and complaining that many of the best coaches get no respect and admiration until they are blessed with a very talented swimmer. We need to encourage each other in things we have some control over, like improvement and fitness. The improvement figures above represent almost 400,000 swimmers across the USA. Notice how much less 15-18 year old swimmers are improving on average than fast growing 12 and unders. Is there something more we can do for the swimmers who are stronger, taller, and hopefully smarter than their younger age group peers? And can coaches do a better job even with those younger swimmers by adding UW video, Swimmunicators, private lessons, etc.? In future issues (and in past ones) you’ll see we believe the answer is a very defintive yes! If you are a Pro Subscriber, you can ask for this and coming interactive sheets to some to you interactive to add your own swimmers . You’ll also see comparisons between yours and other local and like teams. And you’ll get a full description on how you can make every day better than the day before.

We took and shared video from all angles underwater, even from a GoPro on the bottom of the pool “looking up”. Swimmers even set up their own camera using our invention and did their own video! We took them in the office and showed them on a big screen a comparison of Olympians and their own strokes and went back in the pool to improve.

We tested kicking time; 400 I.M. times even with our seven year old! Power on the swim bench, stroke counts in all four strokes and much more. We printed them and posted them on a rolling whiteboard and had swimmers climb out and write their improvements as the four day camp went on each day. We had over 200 lifetime bests!

All swimmers got 100% on the final written exam. OK it was open “book” and open Steve, but they learned a lot!

Though we had only half our normal camp time, we still had inner tube polo, in water tug of war, lunch sponsored by Pick Up Stix, ice cream , hot chocolate, and more fun. More detail in this issue, and on the CSSwimcamp.com site

How to REALLY have influence as a leader of ourselves and of others. Do I always get this right? Ask my wife! But, together we can get this right much more of the time.

John Wooden never talked about winning. His basketball programs at UCLA still have the record for most NCAA Championships(11). Teach and live character. Then we win. In that order.

Nir Ayal Teaches coaches how to be INDISTRACTABLE

Specialized

Land

Johnston and Hodges analyzed the kids the way we do them as they prep for Olympic Trials! Then back out to the pool to improve. All this was sent home with swimmers so they can improve all year!

Fun too!

Dr. Liaga taught

Specialized exercises for swimmers

2024 Olympic Swim Schedule in Paris, France

Taylor Swifts Racing Start

Interview with Attila Selmeci

Rocco Meering

Texas

Culture

Coach and care for

The WHOLE Swimmer

Schubert asking American record Holder David Johnston about Team Culture at Texas.

This is what I’m after in helping coaches embrace putting up tracking sets that everyone has a chance to improve, doing self video, etc. instead of just rewarding talent. Schubert is known for being a tough taskmaster -- 8K a practice, etc. But, what people who don’t know him don’t know is how he builds a culture people want to be part of, to thrive in, and in which to encourage each other.

Can your team improve in this area? Coaches, swimmers, and parents you might then consider attending our summer camp in Riverside California. We do a great job with swimmers -- teaching them to video themselves and one another, giving a final exam on the elements they need to know to be enthusiastic about, doing test sets they bring back to their teams, etc.

We also take a half hour at the end of each camp day to let the swimmers have ice cream while we talk and listen to coaches and parents. Many parents even stayed during the day and got to know one another, our staff doctor, etc.

Mark has agreed to join us this summer and you should be there. If it’s not Eddie Reese, Mark is the most successful team leader in history (over 50 National Championships, for example) and you owe it to yourself to find out how the same will be said about you! Hope to see you in August, or in a Zoom, clinic, etc.

Sweetenham

One of history’s great coaches, Australian Bill Sweetenham is the one who asked me in an e-mail last year: “what’s wrong with USA Swimming?” This is his most recent letter to me as I have kept him in the loop of the battle many of us have fought to get open comparative data so American teams will compete in what matters most: improvement at each stage of physical development and fitness (drop-off) rates.

“Steve as usual I believe you are on the right track with regard to your data analysis. Please feel free to share this response with George Heidinger and Jack Roach ......as they were on this same or very similar subject many years ago. Whilst we talked in depth about this however they felt “ that the USA had been here before and the coaching strength of the combined club and collegiate strengths would see them clear the threatening storm clouds appearing and gathering momentum on the performance horizon of USA. I have studied swimming in the United States for all of my coaching life of some 60 years. I have enormous respect for all associated within swimming in your country from learn to swim to international.

It has and still remains my conviction that if you are, as an international coaching operator of excellence than you must clearly understand and accept that you must be able to challenge and be competitive ( in Olympic finals ) with the USA on an end result and outcome.

The USA has always been the standard to which you would and could be your jury of achievement on the Olympic international stage. Whilst this remains so ; it is being seriously under threat and challenged in recent times.

As an example coaches from George Haines ; Don Gambril ; Gregg Troy ; Mark Schubert; Dick Hannula ; Dick Schoulberg ; Eddie Reese ; Dennis Pursley ; Dave Salo :Sherm Shavuor ; Randy Reese ;Peter Banks ; Nort Thornton ; Paul Bergen ; Doc Councilman; Peter Daland ; Bud McAllister ; along with many others enjoyed a very united front of intimidation over many decades of dominance of world swimming with their combined presence on the deck at all major World and Olympic events. There did not exist any soft wins when these operators were on the march. They accepted they were responsible and accountable for their winning athletes at the Olympics without blame , excuses or reasons.

They intimidated with their presence all that went up against the might of US Swimming.

Bill Pilzuk who came and contributed significantly to British Swimming during my time there explained that there was an unwritten protocol that every swimmer selected on an Olympic Team for the USA was “expected” to hop on the return flight with at least one medal. Unwritten but expected.

Each team from the USA enjoyed a formidable reputation !!!!!!!

According to my evaluations and observations this has changed significantly and not for the better. For instance I asked many world level coaches ...... who are the Olympic Coaches for the 2024 USA Olympic team and how have their roles changed in the last 2 Olympics.... blank looks indicated the previous formidable and invincible reputation has been for whatever reasons eroded.

It appears there is great marketing in swimming in the USA however not one person is responsible for performance outcomes ........ leaves me wondering is leadership lacking on the coal face of international performance swimming in the United States.

Whilst blind Freddy is aware that the pre Olympic world championships and pre Olympic Commonwealth games are an extremely poor indicator of Olympic out comes with a very small number of super stars and genetic super talented providing some exceptions.

Steve , please share this with Eddie and Gregg ! Keep up your great work that you do not only for performance in your country but also the reflective influence this will apply to world swimming.”

Your friend. Bill

Bill Sweetenham, AM, Churchill Fellow

Equipment Ideas for a new season

Available at Competitiveswimmer.com

Educational Equipment Ideas: They only master what they KNOW

E-mail Steve@Competitiveswimmer.com

Faster

Swimming

fun

Make time for Play

The Learning Curve

Ups and Downs

Puberty and Swimming

Social Swimming

Why Kids Quit Swimming (and how to retain them)

Rent a Bus -- Travel as a reward

Budget by Values Not Tradition

Junk Food at Meets

Breakfast Of Champion Swims

Does Cross Training Really Work?

Essential relationships between parent, swimmer & coach

Swim in your own lane -- Dr. Goldberg

Stay in the moment -- grab the water before you throw it!

9 Habits of Highly Effective Coaches and Swimmers

Teaching the power of gratitude -- be thankful and ask to be thanked!

Handling injury

Preventing injury

Building the best environment on purpose

Fit or fast?

Stroke or win?

Building commitment by example (for leaders and swimmers)

Training Partners

Do what you love; Love what you do (even when it's tough!)

Expanding what they learn in swimming to a LIFE of mastery

Eliminating distractions

The problems and opportunities of tech

Myths

The Code of Talent

Late Bloomers in Swimming

Swimming Science-- Doc to Ernie and beyond

Risk Taking for Swimmers and Coaches

Assertive Discipline by Lee Cantor

Who writes your team newsletter?

Who runs your team website?

The Mindful Swimmer

What swimmers coaches, and parents really want

Define: A perfect swim meet? A perfect practice?

Hiring or building an unbeatable coaching staff