Coaches Need to Believe in Swimming's Reckoning

Right now, the leading story in Olympic sports is Gymnastics. Specifically, the actions of one team "doctor" Larry Nassar, who was allowed by many people with the power to stop him to molest hundreds of teenage girls.

Many are asking the right questions in this moment. How did we let this happen? How did so many people fail to protect these young athletes and enable such monstrous behavior?

Gymnastics is having a reckoning, with no end in sight. If anything, the pace of change only seems to be accelerating, with the stunning move to no longer have national team athletes train at Karolyi ranch.

I know a lot of people in swimming that think our "reckoning" is mostly over. What's closer to the truth is that it never happened. 

USA Gymnastics CEO Steven Penny had to resign in disgrace last March, and new CEO Kerry Perry is basically in constant damage control for the very existence of USA Gymnastics as an organization.

In swimming, Chuck Wielgus was able to assume a defensive posture, black out media except for the groveling Brent Rutemiller of Swimming World, and slowly start to implement "SafeSport" measures. He was able to retire with many people within USA Swimming considering him some kind of hero. 

New CEO Tim Hinchey has also been allowed to ignore USA Swimming's legacy altogether. In the near future I'll be asking him to come on a podcast to do a bit more than the current gestures toward SafeSport.

We can make all the rules we want. We can ban coaches, and make educational programs. None will address the true problem that our greater society is actually talking about and finally seeing a reckoning on. When "men" hold nearly all the power in anything, it will be abused, and anyone down the power food chain will suffer.

I've watched my "group", coaches remain mostly silent on this topic. We are the on the ground leaders of this sport, but we have failed to provide leadership. The major coaching organizations have shied away.

So I've decided that we need to organize as coaches to stand up for the most vulnerable people in our sport. I'm starting a group "Coaches Who Believe".

What does that mean? Instead of the status quo, (which is do nothing), we will trust people in our sport who come forward to say that they have been abused. We will work to verify those claims, instead of ignoring them or reflexively dismissing them. We will not leave the victims of abuse in our sport on an island, with only a handful of people to support them.

As for leadership of the organization, I hope that as soon as it gets some members I can cede that to someone else, preferably non-male. It's time to let somebody else run things for a while.

Kate Kovenock Is Bringing Brown Back From the Dead

A decade ago, Brown Swimming and Diving was in a dark place. In a league where you can practically set your watch to some order of finish between Harvard, Princeton and Yale, Brown was among the schools fighting to be "the best of the rest". Then, their pool, old and weird but 50m long, broke.

Brown tried to soften the recruiting blow it knew was coming by immediately announcing a new pool, but it would be years, spanning the career of entire classes, before that building materialized. 

But this blog is not about pool construction. It's about coaching. In 2014, Brown made a bold decision. They would split their men's and women's team. bucking a nationwide trending towards "combining" programs.

They hired Kate Kovenock, coming off a run as an assistant at Notre Dame that saw her take Emma Reaney, a 1:02 high school 100 breaststroker, to a 57.7. Oh, and she won Notre Dame's first women's NCAA title in the 200 breast.

Kovenock somehow remains underrated and undermentioned. But here's the short story: she was a top Division 3 swimmer. She kicked butt as an assistant coach at Kenyon. She tore it up at Notre Dame. When she came to Brown, the team had finished 6th in the conference the previous year and was non-competitive in relays.

The team would finish 6th again in her first year. But it was the most possible improvement you could possibly get and not make a move in the standings. All of a sudden, swimmers were having "Emma Reaney" like moments.

Kate Dillione, a 53 100 yard freestyle who had swum nicely at Brown, found an extra gear for her senior year and recorded a 49.68. The women's 400 freestyle relay leapt up to title contention with a second place finish. 

By her second season, Kovenock's team started to climb the standings, finishing 5th. Ally Donahue, a 2:21 high school breaststroker, was winning an Ivy title in 2:12. By 2016-2017, only a league record from ascendent Yale could stop Brown's 200 Medley relay from coming out on top.

I got inspired to write this because this past weekend, Harvard eeked out a victory over Brown in a double-dual, 166-134. Brown had to absorb the punishment of Harvard going 1-2-3 on both diving boards. I guarantee you the trend line of this dual meet, which as of last year was not close, does not comfort anyone in Cambridge.

Making a swimming powerhouse at Brown University is no easy task, but Kovenock seems up to the task. She's proving right now that she's one of the best young college coaches in the entire country by making Brown an exciting place to follow again. 

Remember That Tom Brady Used To Be Lazy

I only loosely follow the American football, but I am told that Tom Brady of the New England Patriots is one of the best football throwing men, if not the best in history. I've also heard that Bill Belichick is one of the most successful former Division III Lacrosse players at coaching American football. 

Now 40 and still playing at a high level, Brady's work ethic has only grown more legendary by the year. Perhaps you've heard about it, and there's a lot to be learned from what he has accomplished. As long as you don't follow the part that says proper hydration will save you from sunburns, which is about on the same level as some of the more byzantine swimming "training" methods. But I digress. 

Brady's legend grew out of the fact that in a certain point of time, many wise football men did not think that he would be one of the best ball throwers. To me, that is the interesting part of the story, when I think about what we do as coaches.

Why did so many people miss that Tom Brady was going to be great? Because he wasn't, yet. He came to the NFL Draft combine in 2000 and completely bombed, particularly in terms of his physical fitness. Tom Brady was not working (that) hard in 2000.

He was 22 going on 23 before he started to figure out what he needed to do to reach his ultimate potential. His lack of drive at that age meant that he nearly missed out on even playing professionally at all. 

I think about this while I'm watching a high school freshmen loaf his way up and down a pool, legs immobile as if he's got an imaginary rope binding his ankles. I remind myself when he stops short of the wall to make a joke to his friend. Does it make me angry? Of course it does.

So let's remain optimistic. We ought to be hopeful that people can figure it out, and that many of them will need abundant chances to do so. 

I remember being a teenager. I did not walk uphill both ways, in the snow. I did a lot of boneheaded things and wasted my potential and acted like a jerk when any well-meaning adult tried to talk to me about it. 

Somewhere out there, some part of Lloyd Carr is probably pissed that Tom Brady didn't figure out how to be TOM BRADY a little sooner. That's just how it goes sometimes. 

Three Things I was Dead Wrong About in 2017

A lot of people are putting up posts right now, collecting their best content of 2017. That sounded too boring and lazy to me, so instead here's what I'm going with. This blog has always been a space where I've been outspoken, and will continue to be that in 2018.

Despite some of my more controversial takes, I do try to not open my mouth about something unless I feel really confident in what I know. That's why you won't find me putting up articles about dryland, injury prevention or physics. I know a little about those topics (well, maybe not physics) I know I wouldn't want to read a blog written by somebody who just fires off about whatever.

Still, despite being somewhat careful in the topics I choose and what I know about them, I still miss the mark some time. So here's a post for everybody that has gotten furious about at least on the three posts I am about to feature. I'm sorry- I was wrong.

1. Expect Weirdness in Budapest: 

I had a pretty good 2016 predicting some big things in swimming. That gave me a little confidence to keep it going in 2017. But this post, predicting what would happen at the Budapest World Championship, had some big whiffs. To whit:

• I predicted that there would no women medalists in the 100 fly. Then Kelsi Worrell got a bronze. Doh. 
• Likewise, I didn't have much faith in the women's IM crew to get any medals. In fact I didn't even think enough of Madisyn Cox to feature her in the post. 

2. Virginia Should Hire Stefanie Moreno

I may be stretching the definition of "dead wrong" here, but bear with me. When revisiting this article, I feel two things are equally true:

• Virginia made a good decision to hire Todd DeSorbo, who immediately put together a strong coaching staff and the early results on UVA are really positive. You can't really argue with the decision they made, plucking the top assistant from a top ten program within the same conference. 
• There are other schools that will not be mentioned that totally blew it by not hiring Moreno. I have heard from several sources that she was turned down for several jobs where the person hired just doesn't have a resume that stacks up to Moreno. That's wrong and a blown opportunity for those schools. 

3. Announcing the Under One Project

A year and one day ago, I announced my personal quest to break a minute in the 100 breaststroke. I have not written about that quest for over seven months.

The reason is simple. My own vanity and my desire to protect it hasn't left me very motivated to tell you that I had weeks at a time where I didn't train or just barely sustained swimming.

That after getting down to a svelte 176 lbs for my last competition in March, I have hovered between 195-200 lbs this fall and winter. I can't fit into half the pants I wore last winter, and I'm embarrassed. 

But I should have, Because I learned in 2017 probably the biggest lesson of my life, and I still only learned it a little bit, if that makes sense. I learned a lot about the power of failure. I learned the emotional power of admitting that you need some help, and how that makes you stronger, not weaker. 

Starting my own business meant more failure in one year than I have experienced in all of my years of swimming, school and coaching combined. That's been hard, but I'm so grateful for the growth. 

A lot of us are making resolutions for the new year. My project was basically a resolution, and it fell apart by around May. It's fair to say I have failed, but also fair to say that five months moving towards something is infinitely better than nothing. And it's not over until I say it's over.

Happy 2018.

Your 2018 Guide To Hating On Michael Andrew

The new year approaches, and with it brings promise. There is the opportunity of a new day, a time for reflection and change.

For people that love to hate on Michael Andrew, 2018 is a really important year. While hating on Michael Andrew has gained in popularity ever since around 2012, there's something special about next year.

You see, this next year Michael Andrew will turn 19, and therefore no longer be a "junior" or "age group" swimmer. That offers some really exciting new avenues for anonymous internet persons to criticize, complain or otherwise minimize the accomplishments of a very fast swimmer.

There is an art to this. Much like Blaming Teri McKeever for Everything, the key to hating on Michael Andrew is to first find your particular soapbox issue, and then find a way, no matter how distant, to connect that issue to Michael Andrew. In that way, Andrew becomes the perfect vessel for whatever you want to complain about in swimming at the moment. 

So without further ado, your guide to hating on Michael Andrew:

1. He Doesn't Even Swim Long Races.

Key Talking Points: Tom Jager made his first national cut in the mile! Matt Biondi swam a lot of yards! Michael Phelps focused on longer races before going to shorter ones! ERIK VENDT SWAM 1000x1000 WITH A PARACHUTE ATTACHED TO HIS BACK

Make sure you ignore: That Andrew decided to swim the 400 IM this year again, making a US Open cut in the event. Oh yeah and he's pretty good at short races. 

2. Race pace training is ruining America

Key Talking Points: A wise old swimming man once told me "Work works, do 100x100". When I asked him why he said "GRIT GROWTH MINDSET and because I said so, also work works". I had to take him on this because of his excellent use of buzz words and lack of scientific evidence. Michael Andrew is not following the wisdom of wise old swimming men.

Make sure you ignore: Science

3. Sometimes, MIchael Andrew Swims Not Fast

Key Talking Points: Look at Golden Boy Michael Andrew, he did not swim fast in a swimming race. I always knew he was not a real golden boy like Michael Phelps who never swam bad. His whole life is a failure because of how he swam bad.

Make sure you ignore: All the times he swims really, really fast. 

4. If Michael Andrew is so good, why doesn't he win all the time?

Key Talking Points: Oh man, did you guys see the World Cup where Michael Andrew lost the 100 IM? What a loser. How could he not even win? How dare he call himself a pro when he cannot even win a stupid World Cup 100 IM.

Make sure you ignore: Andrew set a world junior record in the race, swam the same time at 18 that Michael Phelps did at age 26, and lost out to the World Record performance in the event by an elite SCM sprinter in the prime of his career who was implicated in doping prior to the Rio Olympics.

5. Zane Grothe swam lots of meteryards and got faster

Key Talking Points: Wait, why are we talking about Zane Grothe? Oh, because he made a casual reference to increasing his "volume" and then broke some American SCY distance records. Hmmm, maybe I should be listening more to wise old swimming men. "Volume" is good and race pace training is destroying the fabric of American values. Michael Andrew likes race pace. 

Make sure you ignore: Any information from Indiana University coaches about how Zane Grothe trains. Any information about how Zane Grothe trained prior to coming to Indiana University. Above all else, please ignore Mike Westphal. He is not doing anything special, coaching wise.

Let's get back on topic

6. He's Not Swimming in the NCAA and Therefore Will Be A Failure in Life

Key Talking Points: This would be the year that Andrew would have begun college swimming had he not declared himself professional at age 14. Had Andrew not declared pro, he undoubtedly would have been the most prized recruit in his class and gotten a full scholarship wherever.

Except Stanford. It's REALLY HARD TO GET into Stanford.

Hey, Cal is a really good school too!

Stop being elitist, the Honors Program at Aub..

FOCUS GUYS!

Make sure you ignore: That he can still go to college. That Michael Phelps took a long time to finish college. That Missy Franklin threw away some of what would probably be here most lucrative professional swimming years and now her career is probably over. Now I'm sad.

If you have read this far, and skipped the tags and categories for this post, please give them another look before losing your mind. 

Does USA Swimming Want Big Clubs?

Yesterday, USA Swimming announced its Club Excellence Results for 2018. Nations Capital Swim Club led the rankings for fourth consecutive year. 

There are a lot of critics of the rankings. The biggest criticism by far? That the rankings favor not just large clubs, but the biggest of the big. 

I've never coached a true USA Swimming club, and my livelihood doesn't depend on these rankings. But I know a lot of people that do. So I want to examine the purpose that USA Swimming sees behind ranking clubs in this way, and whether the criticisms are fair.

Ranking is Good

First off, let me acknowledge one obvious but probably understated fact. Ranking clubs is the right thing to do for a national governing body like USA Swimming.

I coached club swimming outside of the US in Denmark, and one of my primary frustration was that we didn't even have scored meets. Medal count (1st,2nd and 3rd) was the primary marker for deciding on how clubs stacked up.

Because of this, clubs were motivated to produce "medalists", and in my opinion, less than focused on helping swimmers who were not potential medal winners on the national level.

That medal focus meant a lot of squandered opportunity for Danish swim clubs. What is important in the US context to recognize is that if USA Swimming did nothing to rank clubs, there would still be some ad hoc way that clubs measured themselves against each other, and it would probably be worse (like medal count). So credit to USA Swimming for stepping into the void.

What Do We Want?

USA Swimming has some stated goals for the program. Let's take them one by one:

"Promote the development of strong, well-rounded age group..." Pretty simple, they want to avoid teams focusing on a small number of swimmers. However, the rankings do not account for age whatsoever. The assumption made by USA Swimming is that producing the high level results necessary for scoring in the program is a byproduct of "well rounded age group" training.

"and senior swimming programs that produce elite 18 & under athletes." They also want senior swimming and "elite" junior swimmers. The standards used for scoring are designed for these athletes, with the "gold times" specifically set to international world rankings from the previous year. 

"Provide recognition and resources to motivate and assist member clubs to strive for the highest ideals of athlete performance". They believe these rankings will promote the two above goals.

So Tell Me How It Works Again...

If you're confused, so was I the first 100 times I tried to understand this program. Let me try and give one case of how NCAP got such a high ranking this past year.

The "points" scored are "FINA Points". FINA points are built on a scale where 1000 is equal to a world record swim. So for example, in the 200 Butterfly, a 1000 point swim is 1:51.51, the same as Michael Phelps world record. 

Confusingly, USA Swimming has its own, similar, "power points" system that is not FINA points, which you can find when you do a time search for a swimmer. 

Anyway, one of the biggest reasons NCAP got a high ranking was Sam Pomajevich. The University of Texas freshmen swam a 1:57.62 in the 200 fly this past summer. That swim gave him 852 FINA points.

Because that time also achieved the club excellence "gold" ranking, that total was doubled, meaning Pomajevich scored 1704 points (NCAP's total was 91,597) with just one swim. A swimmer at Pomajevich's level alone can account for tens of thousands of points in this scoring system.

What Does It All Mean?

It's hard to think of a system that doesn't reward club size. Having a large club with large membership, by sheer probability, increases the likelihood of both there being a swimmer like Pomajevich and a lot of swimmers at the senior level who can achieve these time standards. If the rankings were changed to account for "depth", larger swim clubs would likely have an even bigger advantage.

These rankings ought to have more thought, however. Large clubs are definitely a more successful business model, and consolidation is happening because of that. But USA Swimming doesn't need to provide an additional boost of marketing to this end.

Large club size is not how American swimming dominates internationally, in fact it is the inverse. We are dominant because we have many places where excellence can grow, not increasingly fewer, coupled with a huge population base.

Small countries that punch above their weight (Denmark, Sweden, the Netherlands) do so because they create an astounding amount of opportunity for both athletes and coaches despite their small population base.

China flounders for its population base because despite a huge investment in outside coaching and chemicals because you have to be elite of the elite to get access to top notch coaching, and there appear to be almost no development or opportunity for domestically born coaches within their system.

Likewise, Russia would probably have some incredible clubs in this ranking system. Their focus on producing "elite" juniors with similar tactics to the Chinese has payed off at the European Junior level. But they are pathetic on the international senior stage, and again must rely heavily on coaches outside of their system to take swimmers to a top international level.

All food for thought as we ponder another year of "club excellence". Do we want big clubs? I say no, and it's up to us to put pressure on USA Swimming to come up with something better.

 

Should We Amputate the Olympics?

Last week, the extremely confusing news that Russia would be banned (kind of, sort of, ok maybe not really banned but we're going to put it in the headlines as banned) from the Winter Olympics broke.

There were a lot of people applauding the decision, including me. Like many of those people, I saw the excellent documentary Icarus . Included in that documentary was a man from the inside of the Russian system telling a lot of us what we already knew: that Russia had state sponsored doping.

I'll admit, I haven't always been with the anti-doping crusaders. I've mocked John Leonard, Craig Lord and others for what I saw as their hysterical takes on doping, specifically as it affects the sport we care about most, swimming.

I'm having Craig Lord on a podcast later this week to discuss this very ban (and hopefully many other things) and what it means.

But for now, I'm left with an incredibly unsettling feeling. Rather than feel comforted by the news out of the IOC, I'm wondering if the Olympics, and how strongly swimming is tied to it, are a recipe for disaster.

It's crazy to say that swimming doesn't need the Olympics. The sport swells to its highest crescendo every four years on the backs of those rings. But there are some serious cracks in the Olympic foundation. 

For one, the IOC and other governing bodies (our lovely FINA, for instance) haven't stood up well against a modern internet age level of scrutiny. So it's hard to credit the IOC for making such an obvious decision. How much more evidence did they need?

I think it's a legitimate question whether swimming should continue to pin its survival to an event organized by crooked plutocrats every four years. With swimmers trying to formalize professional competitive swimming, should we move to abandon ship as a sport before the decision is made for us?

What would we do if suddenly there was no Olympics every four years.? How would we fill that gaping hole? The Winter Olympics is starting to look like a doubtful exercise. How far behind will the summer rendition be?

Would that even work, or given that the corruptive rot extends to FINA as well as NOCs (National Organizing Committees), where do we start running into an organization worth saving in the sport of swimming? 

It's scary to imagine a world without the current organizations that we have, and recreating a lot of the events we love to watch and compete in would not be easy. But we also need to consider whether we've tolerated too many lies in exchange for "nice" swim meets.

How to Do Private Lessons For Year Round Swimmers

Coaching in Denmark was at times the most stressful but also the most fruitful thing I have done in swimming. One experience I am eternally grateful for was the chance to represent Denmark as a coach internationally on three occasions. 

When you're chosen as a coach for one of these teams, you're presented with a challenge. You'll be chosen because you're directly responsible for coaching one or more swimmer on the team. But you'll also be asked to coach swimmers who spend the rest of their year under the guidance of someone else. Beyond just going to the meet, we were also asked to coach swimmers on training camps.

That can basically go one of three ways:

1. You can diverge so greatly, both in terms of stroke feedback and practice type that you severely disrupt what is making the swimmer successful. Egg on your face and an angry coach back home, not to a disappointed and dejected swimmer.

2. You can basically try to be as hands off as possible, give little to no feedback and hope that you don't screw it up.

3. Somewhere in between #1 and #2, you can find a way to help the swimmer in a limited capacity, understanding the limitations of the time you have with them, but also taking the time to figure out what has made them successful up to this point and reinforcing that.

It took me a while to learn #3. I didn't do a very good job the first time I traveled for Denmark. By my third trip, I was getting the hang of it. That experience informs what I do now, which involves private work with swimmers that swim year round.

When you're doing private instruction, it can be tempting to draw contrast between yourself and a swimmers full-time coach. After all, you might assume that swimmers and parents want to see something different from you. You would be wrong.

Swimmers don't benefit from you drawing hard lines between multiple inputs. Instead, you have to find a way to give the swimmer confidence in both the intense instruction you're giving and the team environment they will return to.

I always emphasize to swimmers that I work with that their full-time coaches are responsible for teaching them to do many things right, and I often ask questions to get a sense of the kind of feedback that they may be getting in a team setting that their coach may not have had the time to follow through with them on. 

When you pull this off, the swimmer leaves with more confidence that they are moving forward, but also a renewed faith in the coach they see day in and day out. Even though the swimmers I work with make great strides, I don't publicize who I work with.

When I began this work, I found that in every case coaches were hostile to the idea of someone working privately with their swimmers. I can understand why. Now, I am getting referrals from year round coaches. Why? Because they've realized that I'm just here to help and make them look good in the process.

The best result for me is a swimmer, parent and full-time coach that are all happy with the progress made. I spoke with a parent this morning who credited our private work with her son's renewed commitment to attend morning practice and dedication to his year round team. I'm proud of that- and proud to work in partnership with other coaches.

Are you interested in private instruction that can make a lasting difference in as few as four sessions? Contact me. 

Swimming Myths: Holiday Training and "Mental Toughness"

The holidays are approaching, and all across the country coaches are getting excited. Not for presents underneath the tree, mind you, but for the opportunity that is afforded by the vast majority of American swimmers, who are in some form of school, having a break.

Freed from the shackles of day to day schoolwork, there's an opportunity to train: more, faster, harder. To what extremes varies from coach to coach, but it's often this time of year that I see the type of sets that have no place in the modern swimming world:

12000 IMs (seen in person as recently as 2013)

100x100 (discussed ad nauseum on the internet with plenty of back-slapping)

You don't need more than a couple sets to get my drift do you? My high school swim coach, a person I love and admire, does the dreaded 100x100s around this time of year. I've never been able to convince her not to. I try to keep an open mind to new people I meet who feel these are productive swimming sets, even though I disagree.

There exists absolutely no quantitative evidence for this training whatsoever. Its defenders often fall back on anecdotal or wholly subjective evidence for continuing it.

One of the most frequent anecdotes passed around is the story of Erik Vendt swimming 30x1000 in 2000. While many take away from this story that there is value in insanely long swimming sets, I see it completely differently. To me, this story and the accompanying picture hammers home three things:

1) This type of swimming set can only be justified for the elite of the elite, the .0001 percent of athletes in the sport like Erik Vendt. I have never coached one of those people and very few of us have. 

2) Consent is incredibly important. Erik Vendt did this set when he was 19 years old. He was old enough to ask for it from his coach and do it willingly. I do not believe that 14 year olds can willingly ask for this type of training

3) Phil Spiniello, despite having a very well-shaped bald head, still looks better with hair.

The most maddening and frequent reasoning I see for these types of sets is as follows : that the shared misery of these sets builds "mental toughness".

First, let us rid ourselves of the term "mental toughness" altogether. It's meaning has been so warped and misshapen by false sports masculinity that it has lost most of its tether in reality.

It is used as a catch-all for processes both real and imagined. Swimmers who win are often described as "mentally tough" after the fact. When they're winning, they are "tough". When they lose, all of a sudden not they are not so tough.

When I was a little kid, Mike Tyson looked extremely "mentally tough" until Buster Douglas punched him in the face.

A New Definition

What is it we really want from athletes in our sport? We want resilience in the face of adversity, we want them to thrive and feel real purpose and meaning in what they do. We want them to love to swim.

There are so many ways to build resilience, purpose and positive emotions that do not involve scientifically unsound training that may be effective for only the superhuman outliers on your team. 

Rather than an opportunity for pushing crazy training, the holidays are an opportunity to make more modest adjustments. Swimmers can recover better, and if you do it right, they can emerge from the holiday break refreshed, swimming faster than ever, and with joy to take them through the hard times to come. 

As my colleague Rick Madge and others have pointed out, swimming suffers from a huge survivor bias when it comes to this type of training. The swimmers that can "survive" these types of sets are, like Mike Tyson, described as mentally tough after the fact when they succeed.

We hear about Erik Vendt because he survived. This is another reason to avoid doing this type of training with young kids. Younger kids are very resilient in many ways- that doesn't mean we should force crazy training on them just because they can bounce back.

The biggest problem with building this false sense of resilience is that once the swimmer cannot "survive" this type of training anymore, which comes for many with age, it's absolutely crushing. All across the country, hundreds of college swim coaches, particularly of women, are nodding their heads at that last sentence.

This holiday season, as you head to the pool to train swimmers, think hard about what you are going to do with the opportunity afforded to you.

Give swimmers something challenging, of course, but give them something that lays just beyond their sense of what they can accomplish. Give them something based in scientific evidence so that they can better understand the purpose. Coach them like you would coach yourself.

Happy Chanukah.

Lessons From My Kid: Performance Resistance

Like most parents, I'm proud of my kid. When she accomplishes something for the first time, however ordinary it might be, I get excited.

"Wow she can count past ten now!"

"Did she just use the word excellent? EXCELLENT."

"Awww she said thank you without me even having to ask."

What naturally followed is, however boring it might be for other people, I wanted them to witness the breathtaking progress of learning that I was seeing. So I would ask my daughter to perform, not in so many words, but basically try to trick her into showing off her skills.

She wouldn't. The second she realized that "Dad" was putting her on display, she resisted swiftly. With a wry smile, she'd give the wrong answer, or ignore me altogether. What's up with that?

Jumping in

Now, I happen to be smart enough that I have contracted out teaching my own daughter to swim. She's been taking swimming lessons for a couple of months now, and is just starting to get a little independence around the water.

A couple weekends ago, she jumped from the side of the pool into the water unassisted. I tried to remain composed on the outside, but on the inside I felt pretty much like Chad LeClos' dad in 2012:

My daughter was excited too, but not for the same reason. She just knew that she had been scared but tried something new and it all worked out.

The next weekend being Thanksgiving, there were no swim lessons. I thought to myself- "she's making progress, I should take to her to the pool to reinforce that".

I told her we would go swim together. She was excited. I said "we can practice jumping into the water!" in my best excited dad voice.

Her face turned. "I don't want to go to the swimming pool daddy" she said looking at the floor. I didn't get it at first. Slowly it crept up on me- she instinctively felt that our trip to the pool had turned into another performance. 

I course corrected: "let's go to the pool and play". The response was a resounding "YAY!!!". We drove over and I decided to just get in the water with her and see what happened.

There were other kids there. One of them strode confidently to the side of the pool and jumped into the water, popping up with a wide grin.

"Can I do that daddy?" my daughter asked. I stifled myself, then responded, "yes, of course".

She must have jumped into the water 20 times or more.

Not Only Parents

I know what you're expecting now. There's an obvious lesson for parents here, I can't deny that. Kids want you to be their parent, period, and you should be so lucky to have them remind you of that.

There's a lesson for coaches as well. Yes, our job does involve the performance of athletes, that is unavoidable. But even our non-related "kids" that toil back and forth in the water for us should naturally push back against coaches putting performance first and relationship second. 

No one wants to feel that they are a collection of performances, because everyone has good and bad days, and we all fail many times on our way to success. 

I'll try to remember that when I'm back watching someone else teach the swim lesson this Saturday, but also when I'm the one delivering the instructions to someone else's kid on Sunday.

Why This Blog Exists

Why am I doing this? It's a question you should ask often when you repeat activities over and over again. Habits can form, and that can be a good thing, but it can also be the way you get stuck in a rut.

As we approach the end of the year, I'm asking myself that question with regard to this blog. Why am I writing it? Here are the big reasons:

1. I love to write and it's my preferred method for interacting with other coaches. I love starting a discussion via blog and hearing from other coaches

2. I love swimming. It's a beautiful sport that I carry with me in everything else I do. 

3. I love coaching and coaches, and the powerful influence coaches wield. The best and worst influences I have had in my life (outside of my own parents) have been coaches. 

4. I think that Positive Psychology is still in its infancy in terms of being understood and implemented in the sports world. I would like to see that grow

5. I have built a business around the first four and I would like people to know about it.

The Harsh Truth

Here's something else you can expect from this blog: honesty. There are two things that are true about honesty.

One is that most people value it. The other is that somebody who is being a total jerk will usually say "I'm just being honest" in their defense.

To the latter, I know that my honesty often stings, and sometimes that makes me a jerk. In the past week I've heard someone tell me they are glad for the podcast because they can tell (and I'm paraphrasing) that I'm not as big of a jerk as they thought once they heard my voice.

I heard another coach (Steve Schaffer) respond to my post about the prevalence of the kind of coaching tactics that got Rutgers coach Petra Martin removed. Schaffer, who always tells me when he disagrees with something I wrote (which is what I like about him), said I should be "careful about painting with broad strokes".

So why do I do it? Because I'd like to see coaching in the sport I love get better. I know that occasionally I'm going to over the line and make some people extremely defensive in the process. Just like training in the pool, it's impossible to know where the line is without going over it.

Finally, rather than pointing the finger, I acknowledge that I am part of swimming and the swim coaching community. I am part of what must get better, and I hope that being honest about what I have learned and experienced I can help others get better too.

Want to know more? Write me!

The Line Between Humility and Modesty

I have to admit, that as of a few weeks ago, I didn't really understand what humility and modesty really meant. I thought of them as synonyms and I used them as such:

"Don't be so humble." I would admonish a swimmer for downplaying their accomplishment.

"You're being modest." were my words for a colleague that didn't mention their success.

It wasn't until a few weeks ago, while at a conference, that an aggressive but well intentioned man approached me after I spoke and blew me up. "It's ok to be humble, but you're being modest and it's a problem.".

I took a big gulp and mumbled "can you tell me more about that?" even though what I really wanted to do was get as far away from his critique as I possibly could.

Impostor Syndrome and Self-Promotion

At various stages of our lives, we hear that we must become skilled self-promoters. The first time I can remember being pressed like that was applying to college. It made me deeply uncomfortable. "SELL YOURSELF" was a weird piece of advice that I got over and over again.

When I fully moved to adulthood, I heard a version of the same when it came to applying for jobs. I labored over cover letters and resumes. How could I convince people I would be great for their job without being a lying braggart.

I struggle with something that I think most every person does. Impostor syndrome is that little voice in the back of your head that seeds doubt in your very real accomplishments. It can tell you to be modest- to hold back some of your best qualities and accomplishments as if they aren't real.

The Absence of Exaggaration

Humility, I learned, is something else altogether. Some of the most wildly self-promotional, confident or even trash-talking people I can think of are actually quite humble. Let me explain.

Humility is knowing who you are, and who you are not. It's the lack of false confidence. Garrett McCaffrey termed Lily King the "Larry Bird of Swimming" and the analogy couldn't fit better. Both back up their talk- there's nothing false about what they say.

When Larry Bird announced to other competitors in the inaugural three point contest that they were playing for second place, he was right. 

False Modesty

Modesty is, I've come to understand, false by definition. Imagine if, asked if he was a good shooter, Larry Bird had said "I'm alright". That would be modest of him to say, just as it would if Caeleb Dressel described his start as "pretty good" or Greg Meehan commented that recruiting at Stanford is "going well."

Not admitting that you've done something great doesn't serve others either. Again, imagine again the hypothetical of Caeleb Dressel with a "pretty good" start. What does that leave your average age grouper thinking about their ability off the blocks?

Humility, knowing who you are and what you have accomplished and presenting it without embellishment, is admirable. It's a virtue. Crossing the line and downsizing your accomplishments doesn't serve you or others. When it comes to it, draw the line at humility.

Talent: For When We Can't Explain

Talent. it's a word that we somehow cannot escape in sports. People define and use it a lot of different ways. It's meant to describe someone's "natural ability" for something, that when combined with a process of improvement, provides a crude formula for performance.

For the purposes of this post, I want to talk about a slice of that definition that is particularly troublesome. Talent is often assigned to individuals after the fact. We look at somebody who has already performed well and declare that they are "talented". Too often, this designation distracts us understanding the process by which that person gets better.

Take Anthony Ervin. Countless people have told me how "talented" Anthony is. He's a good example, because the talent description is more frequently given to sprint swimmers. If you read Anthony's book, you'll find a lot of frustrated swim coaches. They couldn't get Anthony to be "with the program".

The implication for many would be that Anthony Ervin did not work hard. In fact, his book lays bare that Anthony had a very different process for improving his swimming. I think many people did not understand this process, but I don't believe that talent takes you to a gold medal in the 50 free.

So, the next time you are considering a fast swimmer and their "talent", challenge your assumption of their natural ability. Admit that maybe, just maybe, there is something about the process by which they became fast that you do not yet understand. 

As coaches we have so much to learn from swimmers. All throughout coaching I hear the quote that "there are many ways up the mountain" to describe the different ways coaches coach and still have successful swimmers. What I believe is that swimmers can find many aways up the mountain, some of which we as coaches didn't even think were possible. 

It's Time To Reconsider Diana Nyad and Jack Nelson

Diana Nyad says that she was sexually assaulted by her swim coach, Jack Nelson, starting in 1964.  Most recently to the New York Times, she told her story in graphic detail. Nyad is a vexing case to write about, primarily because she has told a lot of tales about her open water exploits.

As Nyad was garnering national coverage for her Marathon swimming exploits, there was a frothing rage in the Marathon swimming community. Many of the things that she said just didn't add up. 

So, there's ample evidence that we shouldn't trust Diana Nyad when she starts telling us about her open water swims. Those lies should not, however, cast doubt on what she has to say about Jack Nelson.

Nyad has consistently accused Nelson, despite the fact that the most powerful people in swimming don't acknowledge her. In fact, they instead lauded Nelson, who to this day sits in two Hall of Fames, both the International Swimming Hall of Fame, and the American Swim Coaches Association Hall of Fame. 

I'm going to write to a coach today, a coach I've made no bones about my admiration for. I'm going to ask them how they feel about sitting in the same Hall of Fame with Jack Nelson. If someone you admire is on this list, you might consider doing the same. 

In the broader cultural upheaval we are all witness to, it's time to revisit what Dyana Nyad has been telling us for decades. We can right this wrong, but only if we choose to believe her on this. Nyad has gained little and lost a lot by speaking out.

Imagine the message we are sending to people who are being abused right now. They can confidently tell themselves that not only will they not be believed, but their coach will be held in high esteem and never pay for his crimes. By believing Nyad we can send a better message to the most vulnerable people in our sport.

The Failure of Self-Esteem and Other Movements

I was raised in the hey-day of the self-esteem movement. Or at least it seemed like it. When I was young, I can remember coaches, teachers and adults all-around fretting about the self-esteem of youngsters. Self-esteem was the answer to all life's challenges.

Depressed? You need high self-esteem! You'll feel better about yourself and won't be so sad.

Eating disorder? It's because your self-esteem is low, so you're seeing a fat person in the mirror.

Anxious? Relax! We weren't so good at even recognizing anxiety in those days, so we often didn't graft self-esteem on 

Bullies had low self-esteem, and somehow so did the kids they were bullying. Criminals? Suffering from low self-esteem. If only we could raise the collective self-esteem, we could sure solve a lot of problems.

The Solution Graft

Seen with 2017 eyes, all of the above seems ridiculous. In fact, the pendulum seems to have swung so far in the other direction. "Kids these days" are criticized for their excessive self-esteem. They want everything right now because they are so special, so precious, right?

Meanwhile, all the problems that self-esteem was supposed to solve are still there and getting worse. 

The lesson here is not about self-esteem. Rather, it's about how we graft whatever piece of psychology that goes mainstream to the problems we want to solve, occasionally to disastrous results. It's how we fail to interrogate the solution as we race to apply it.

For all the talk about how people are throwing pills at their problems, there is an almost equal willingness to plug the solution du jour into any situation. Last week I wrote about how "mindfulness", especially in the form of meditation, has grown as a "solution" that can be grafted onto a lot of problems. 

As a coach and writer, I know there is a long list of concepts I don't write about because I simply don't know enough about them. I don't know enough about a lot of things to ensure that if I put it out there I wouldn't do harm. It's humbling, even sometimes crippling, to consider all of the things you don't know. 

When it comes to the psychological trends of the day, the best way I've found to avoid the "self-esteem" problem is to cast doubt on them until I'm out of disputations. It's one of the reasons that, while my ego absolutely hates it, my rational mind loves when people are highly critical of what I write.

They've often come up with a new argument, one I hadn't thought of, and i'm a little bit wiser for it. So, I guess what I'm saying is, to all the biggest critics of this blog: thanks. 

The Selflessness Switch

The question was "How do people with jobs that require pessimism: lawyers, firemen, policemen, turn that switch off in the rest of their lives?". It was posed to Martin Seligman, the father of Positive Psychology and the man behind "Learned Optimism".

It was a stumper. Seligman is man with many answers but he couldn't conjure a satisfying response to this one. Lawyers, who must imagine the worst possible outcomes for their clients and do everything to prevent it, or policemen, who must imagine the worst possible threats to their own and others safety, must somehow find a way to flip into a completely different mindset when they put their job down for the day.

It made me think about coaching, a job that doesn't require pessimism. It does, however, on many levels require selflessness. Coaches feel a strong pull to day in, day out, put themselves out to the athletes in their charge and not always get the same in return. Which begs the question: how can coaches switch their selflessness enough to be their best selves?

Too much of a good thing

Some of the best coaches I know are selfless to a fault. Let me explain. They are suffering from health problems related to their lack of self-care. I recognize the trap because I've fallen into it too many times to count.

The last time I can remember was a year ago. My mother was dying of a brain tumor, and I had the time and flexibility to pour myself into caring for her. I didn't set good boundaries. Before I knew it I was deep down in a hole, deeper than I'd ever been in my life. 

The best coaches I know can tell a similar story. About how they don't make time to exercise but are there for every kid they coach (including running extra practice for Allie so she can go to that lecture). Or how they've foregone relationships because it was just too hard to fit into their coaching schedule with so many nights and weekends.

Or how they've stayed and coached a team because they felt such strong loyalty to the swimmers that they work with their, sacrificing a better life for their own family so that other families can thrive.

I certainly don't have an answer, but I want to start looking for one. Coaches need a selflessness switch, a way to turn off the thing that makes them so great for the athletes they coach for long enough to be great to themselves.

The Poop Sandwich Does Not Work

Long ago, I was taught a very simple formula for delivering critical feedback to a swimmer. For the purposes of this blog I'm calling it the poop sandwich, although it is usually described more colorfully. Here's how it goes:

Positive feedback: "Hey great job having a pulse!"

Negative feedback: "However a heart rate of 85 is sub-optimal for swimming improvement. Let's get it up"

Positive feedback: "You chose a wonderful pair of goggles today."

The idea of the poop sandwich is simple. People do not like getting criticism, so you sandwich it in two slices of delicious praise. Somehow or other, the poop sandwich has had some legs as a coaching technique.

Unfortunately, no matter how well you dress it up, it's still just shit.

The Bigger Picture

There is a kernel of truth to the sandwich. Nobody likes to be nagged. Excepting people who are stuck in abusive relationship patterns, individuals do not seek out overwhelmingly negative feedback.

Getting people to listen to tough feedback as a coach is more than anything dependent on the quality of relationship with that person. Research suggests that close relationships need at least a 5:1 ratio of positive to negative interactions to be successful. 

What does that look like in a coaching relationship? Well the first part is that you will need a lot more positive feedback than the sandwich provides. Here are some ways I like to get that ratio  up:

1. Express gratitude: Tell swimmers on an individual level what you are grateful for about them. Speak to their character and do not take them for granted things they do day to day

2. Acknowledge progress: In coaching, you can get really far on your ratio by recognizing progress. Sometimes a coach can focus on "not there yet" instead of "one step closer". Acknowledge one step closer, however big or small.

3. Call them out when they help a teammate. Make it explicit!

4. Empathize. Even if it may not seem "positive", letting your athletes know you see them when they are struggling is something that they will carry with them in their relationship with you.

Honesty Matters

The poop sandwich also doesn't work because people can smell it coming from a mile away. It often feels inauthentic and forced. You know instinctively when someone else is dressing up criticism with some compliments, and often forget the compliments.

Focusing on finding authentic moments outside of when you have to deliver tough criticisms will go a long way to making your critical feedback far more effective.

Want to learn more about how to incorporate Positive Psychology into your coaching? Write me.