Results or Process Oriented?

I was having a chat with a parent of one of my swimmers the other day and we were reminiscing about our swimming as kids. The parent was wondering why their kid didn't always "go after it and race." We always did as kids they said. I think they are right and wrong, but it did get me thinking about a couple of things.

First things first. Swimming and all sports are different now, because there is so much more on the line for these kids. One of my girls was given a full ride this year, it's worth, $160,000. That's a whole other animal than the $10,000 scholarship I had. With the upped money comes upped pressure and upped expectations. Parents and coaches talk about scholarships much more now as the goal. It's real and its scary. All those scholarships depend on two things in a kids mind...where you rank in a recruiting class and what your times are. So your ability to make nearly $200,000 depends on those two things. How stressed are you now? We need to remember this when talking to our kids and athletes and ourselves.

Both of these pressures, rank and times, weigh heavy on kid's minds and most of the time they find themselves focusing on one or both of them. Here is the issue. A swimmer's time and a swimmer's rank depend solely on their ability to do one thing, swim to the best of their ability. The place where a swimmer is concerned about rank and times are meets, but the place where they become their best is at workout. In other words, most of the attention and effort goes into meet day, as does the stress. Unfortunately, this is backward. If that energy and pressure and stress went into workout, race day and subsequently times and rank would just follow along. When they go to a meet, the ONLY concern is HOW we swim our best. What's the race strategy, how do I go fast, what am I committed to doing? Swim your best and the times will follow. Period.

We all need to stop talking about results and times in swimming. We need to talk about skills and race plans. Technique and strategy. RACE has big meets coming up. Let's go be better swimmers.