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Feb 15, 2022
Cheat Codes
For those fortunate enough to grow up playing Nintendo, Sega Genesis, and the like, you’ll remember that some of those games were hard....
Feb 8, 2022
Living on the Edge
Without stress, there is no adaptation. Without challenge, there is no growth. In the first case, there is no physiological change,...
Feb 1, 2022
The Price of Gold
‘Every day, athletic stars are honored for their success. TV monitors broadcast their faces across the world. To create international...
Jan 25, 2022
Let's Talk About Our Feelings Part II
As described in the first part of this series, the creation of appropriate tasks is the first step when enhancing effective skill...
Jan 18, 2022
Let's Talk About Our Feelings Part I
In Feedback, I argued that traditional feedback in the form of verbal instruction has several shortcomings, primarily that it impaired...
Jan 11, 2022
Rules of Engagement
From business to sports, everyone talks about the importance of culture and building a strong culture. At that same time, culture is...
Jan 4, 2022
Feedback
Without feedback, learning doesn’t happen. However, how we define feedback, and how feedback is used, might be moving us closer to...
Dec 28, 2021
On Models and Principles
Throughout the history of swimming, technical models have often been based upon the traits of the successful champions of the day. These...
Dec 21, 2021
Death By 1,000 Cuts
I'd like to pose a question to move toward an idea that approaches technical development and skill acquisition from a different...
Dec 14, 2021
Reset
In the original Nintendo video game console, there were two buttons. There was a power button and a reset button. When it wasn’t going...
Dec 7, 2021
Effort Versus Intent
We’ve all coached the swimmer who consistently puts tremendous effort into their training and their races, yet that effort is not...
Nov 30, 2021
Systematic Skill
5 Simple drills to fix your freestyle! This is the type of headline you might see advertised in various articles and magazines, and for...
Nov 23, 2021
Coaching with Style Part II
In part I, we explored two fundamental, yet somewhat contradictory skills that coaches need to be successful in helping swimmers improve....
Nov 16, 2021
Coaching with Style Part I
There are two critical coaching skills that are complementary, yet contradictory. The challenge is that both skills are critical to...
Nov 9, 2021
Distraction Control
Coaches, athletes, and humans all want it all, and they all want it all right now. As a result, they try to do it all right away. This...
Nov 2, 2021
Everybody Counts or Nobody Counts
‘Everybody counts or nobody counts.’ -Harry Bosch Often, coaches focus their attention on the ‘best’ swimmers, or those swimmers they...
Oct 26, 2021
The Relevance of Race-Relevant Training Part II
In part I, we examined the concept of race-relevant training as opposed to race-specific training with the purpose of providing a...
Oct 19, 2021
The Relevance of Race-Relevant Training Part I
How we think about training, and how we conceptualize the training process, is ultimately going to influence how we choose to design...
Oct 12, 2021
More Jedi Mind Tricks
In a previous article, I described several ways in which small changes in communication can have a major impact on behavior, often in...
Oct 5, 2021
Sensitive Kids Part II
In part I, the concept that excessive training intensity can compromise the training process was discussed. While this should be no...
Sep 28, 2021
Sensitive Kids Part I
The harder they work, the slower they get. Unfortunately, this statement characterizes some of the swimmers we coach. In some cases,...
Sep 21, 2021
The Problem with Perfect
Practice makes perfect. A well-worn performance cliché. It sounds great until you consider that it doesn’t address the quality of the...
Sep 14, 2021
The Stopwatch
As technology has progressed, there are more and more options available to coaches and swimmers that claim to be the answer to everyone’s...
Sep 7, 2021
The Circus Part II
In part I, we started with the idea that each swimmers’ needs become more specialized as their performance levels and training histories...
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