The Secret to (Self) Coaching, Part 1/2 I normally do not write articles, but it was requested of me by one of my swimmers

to put together something comprehensive regarding strategies on effective coaching/self-coaching. Given that I expect more from them than an average coach (I expect them to write essays on occasion), I contend that it is only fair that they request from me more than an average swimmer does from their coaches. I am far from an expert on the topic of coaching/self-coaching (which I will henceforth express as coaching unless I specifically want to indicate self-coaching). My analysis of the matter comes strictly from watching swimmers and others coaches, reading articles, and my own coaching and athletic experience. Most of what you read in this article will not be new information, but that is exactly the message I will attempt to convey. Successful coaching is less about how much you know and more about how much you apply. I, like most people, think that the pursuit of knowledge is incredibly important to improving your coaching skills, but I find that most people misunderstand when knowledge is useful. The most important component to coaching is being able to apply your knowledge. Once all your knowledge is successfully applied, you will be required to get more of it so that your athletes can continue to grow. It is not an accumulation of knowledge that will make them fast, it is the presentation of what you know. The same goes for an athlete who wishes to self-coach (as all athletes should). Knowing proper technique in butterfly is far less important than trying to constantly apply the technique that you know. Knowing that you are supposed to load your chest deeper than your hand entry is a great piece of knowledge, but completely useless if 1) you do not know why it is important and 2) you do not bother to practice it. I have developed a four part strategy for successful coaching that I try to use with my swimmers (in both coaching and self-coaching). It is outlined as follows: 1. 2. 3. 4. Determine the problem Figure out a solution to the problem Apply the solution/communicate the solution Reassess

I should really draw that out in a flow chart because number four usually leads back to number two as my solutions rarely fix the problem (and this is ok!). Number three has a slash in it because that is the only step that differs between coaching and self-coaching. Coaches need to effectively communicate the solution to a swimmer, and the swimmer needs to effectively apply it. I assume that anyone reading this is a high performance athlete, high performance coach, or aspiring to be one of the two. I define high performance by a constant desire to improve. I contrast that to doing something recreationally, where you are content with the level of your performance and do not wish to change it. Most people believe in a different philosophy, and while I admit that mine is unorthodox, I think it serves the models of true high performance and true recreation better than the traditional results based definitions. Under my definitions, a male swimmer who has a 2:10, 200m freestyle can be more of a high performance athlete than a male swimmer who goes under 1:55. If the 2:10 athlete is constantly improving his stroke, changing his technique, trying new things, and listening to feedback, he will soon get to the 1:55 level. This is a high performance athlete. If the 1:55 athlete has pulled a 1:55 for the last 3 years, has raced predictable races all resulting in the same time and makes no effort to change, he is not a performance athlete in my books.

This conclusion has been drawn from my own observations during my time with the Richmond Hill Aquatic Club. I coach some swimmers who are fast, but will repeat the same race over, and over, and over again. It gets to the point where I can predict exactly what their splits will be, when they breathe, at what point in the race they will break down, how many dolphin kicks they take off each wall, etc Its almost like when you see a movie enough times and can recite the lines. These athletes that make no effort to change see no change to their times. They race fast and they try hard, I do not dare take that away from them, but they do not improve. They will never improve unless they make changes. There is a quote supposedly from Albert Einstein; I cannot actually attribute it to him because Ive only ever heard it in hearsay, but regardless of who authored it, it strikes a resounding bit of truth: Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. When I tell that to swimmers, they respond that it is obvious, that it is not quite the revelation I hyped it up to be. But remember the purpose of this articlemost of what you read here will not be new information. Maybe it will give you a fresh perspective though, or show you how important it is to practice what you already know. If doing the same thing over and expecting different results is insanity, then how can an athlete perform the same race over and over and expect to go faster? Quite simply, they cannot. Something needs to change (and it doesnt have to be in the race, it can be in practice where they change it they can improve their lactic threshold for example and so they will race faster while performing the same race strategy, but the point remains, SOMETHING needs to change). So back to my point about who is the high performance athletean athlete who races fast and makes no changes in practice or at meets, or an athlete who is developing because they consistently make changes in both practices and races. Sometimes they are faster, sometimes they are slower, but they learn from every experience, and overall if you plot their results from year to year, season to season even, you see improvement. I hope that sets up the premise of this article. This article is in support of athletes/coaches trying new things, making changes, and most importantly, looking to improve. If you do not want to get better, this article is not for you. If you have read this far and agree with most of the propositions I have made, then you are probably an athlete/coach who has the desire to get better (wants their athletes to get better) and wants to know how to improve.

Step 1: Determine the Problem If you want to go faster/you want your athletes to go faster, they will have to do something better. This stems from the point I was speaking to above, that something will have to change if they want to improve. If you accept the premise that you need to improve something, then a second one can ariseyou (athlete) are not doing something as well as you can be doing it. This is the problem. I dont mean that this is the problem in a bad way, its not like your elementary school teacher who called you into the office to tell you there is a problem. I mean it a more scientific way. Consider it a math problem if you will. You need to get to the solution. I think that analogy expresses the idea of a problem well.

You need to be able to identify a problem in your swimming/your athletes swimming so that they can improve. That is the easy part The hard part is identifying the problem No seriously, saying you need to fix something and figuring out what to fix are two very different animals. So the million dollar question is, How do I find my problem? or better phrased, How do I find my most PRESSING problem?. For this I recommend you look at your end goal. What do you want to accomplish in what time period? Say you want to drop 4 seconds in your 200 freestyle in half a year. That is a big goal, but is possible depending on the athlete and their place in the development model. Once you identify what you want to do, you have to identify how you can do it. To do that, start finding inefficiencies in your race. What is your biggest detriment in racing? What is holding you back the most? I always say that identifying the problem is the hardest step. It requires two things: checking your ego at the door and actually having enough knowledge to recognize a problem. If you are an athlete, thankfully you have an all-knowing and wise coach, the likes of Yoda from Star Wars (you hope). If you are a coach, sorry, no luck for you, you have to know your stuff (thats why they pay you big bucks in the first place. You dont get to drive that Lamborghini for free, you know). Checking your ego at the door is really difficult, especially if you are a higher performing swimmer. I can see the expressions of my faster swimmers when I point out to them that someone slower than them is actually performing a skill better than they are. Few of them look happy, and even less are willing to learn from that slower swimmer. It is unfortunate, because the ones who are willing to learn from anywhere are really showing new found success. I have one swimmer, lets call him Bob, who managed to impress me with how he was willing to constantly learn from everyone: swimmers who are slower than him, coaches who are less experienced, peers, rivals, and even video analysis of other swimmers (I am talking 12 year olds swimming a race from YouTube clips). To this day, he is not the most technical swimmer in the pool, and he has worse water feel and rhythm than a few of the other boys, but he has no problem trying something new, criticizing himself, and listening to feedback. He has improved substantially over the last three years, I believe largely as a result of this way of thinking. I will not tell you his times or his events, but it is enough to impress high performance coaches from other clubs. Once you accept that you are not perfect and that you can find flaws in even Michael Phelps gold medal, record setting Olympic highlights, you can move on to find the problem. I really cannot stress this point enough. A lot of swimmers claim they understand it and they claim they can identify their weaknesses, but they downplay just how severe those weaknesses really are. My dolphin kick needs work says the swimmer, but really what he is thinking deep down inside is My dolphin kick isnt perfect, but its better than X, Y and Zs dolphin kicks, and its gotten me this far. Can it be better? Probably, but its alright That is roughly the message I get from swimmers when they analyze their own races. As a result of that thought, there is no urgency to change the problem. Steps 2-4 obviously require you work on the problem, so if your ego makes you believe that it is not important enough to work on every day, every practice, every 25m, you either have selected a problem that is too small, or you are too arrogant to improve; take your pick. Once you realize it is not an ego game, and swimmers make mistakes, you will realize how much work you actually have to put in to fix the problem, and the severity of the issue goes from DEFCON 5 to DEFCON 1 (it becomes very important). So now youre a humble swimmer who is absolutely willing to find a problem that you will work on every practice, every day for months at a time. No? Reread the last 4 paragraphs (seriously, this is a

huge issue, I can tell you from my own athletic experience in addition to my coaching). Ok, so NOW you are a humble swimmer who is willing to find a problem to work on every practice, every day, for months at a time. Great. We can move on. How do we find the problem? This is where education comes into play. You need to be educated about swimming enough to identify a problem. Education comes from plenty of placesGoogle Scholar, NCCP courses, Maglischos book, Dr. Mullens site, USASwimming/SwimCanada, swimming news sites, videos you can buy (I really like the Richard Quick collection for beginners), seminars and conferences, to list a few. If you seriously cannot find education on a particular element of swimming, please, please, PLEASE contact me and I will either provide it for you or put you in contact with someone who can. Every swimmers problem will be unique, and every swimmer will have a lot of problems, but start with the biggest one. Most strokes start with body position and kicking. That is usually a good place to start searching for problems, but you may have to look a little deeper to identify an issue that you feel needs work. Find the most important elements to the stroke (through your education) and start checking them off on a list compared to your own swimming. In breaststroke for example, you could arguably say that the three most important things are 1) body position 2) rhythm, 3) kicking (since it makes about 60% of your speed). Missing any one of those will severely hamper your race. Start at the top when looking for your problem. Is your body position correct? Is your head correct? Do your hips tilt properly throughout the stroke? Is your back kyphotic? If all the elements of body position are fine, move to rhythm. Do you shoot and kick at the same time, or shoot then kick? Do you load your chest when you load your arms? Do you breathe on the first anchor, or the second anchor? Eventually you will find a problem area with your stroke. Once you find it, you can move on. Ego checked, problem locked and loaded, lets go onto step 2.

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Steps two to four will be released in part two next week. Keep checking back.