Too much swimming?

[AssemblySquare]

My DD is 9. Just joined a new swimming club and the sessions are 5-7pm on Saturday and 3-5pm on Sunday. We’re used to a 30 min session once a week. She’s v good, not amazing, and not yet at competition standard.

My DH thinks it’s too much… I think if she likes it she should go for it! Is 4 hours over 2 days too much??

Oh, and swimming galas are brutal. You might end up at one allweekend while your child swims up and down for 2 minutes, 4 times, once on Saturday am, then on Sat pm, then Sun am, then Sun pm, while you are watching faithfully and fainting with the steamy heat at the pool.

And even though you are happy they are getting faster you start begrudging paying the £9 per race for you swimmer to swim for less than 30 seconds

I started at about 10 and loved it. Two hours twice a week. Still love swimming 30 years later.

A few people have asked about DD… this evening she came out the pool all excited about the things she’s done. She says she wants to do the full 2 hours tomorrow as well!

Talking to another parent, at this stage they’re quite relaxed about doing part sessions or missing one. I know that will change if she gets really good.

Oh - and I’ve been warned already about galas!!!! The parent I spoke to said it costs her £7 to watch about 32 seconds - she was wishing her daughter did longer distances

If she enjoys it then let her do it.

That's standard to lower squad club swimming. The longer sessions build up the stamina and it's mostly aerobic and technical work at this age.

And if dh thinks it's a lot now - pre warn him what it looks like if they move up squads!

My 17yo swims 16 hours and does 3 hours land training a week!

Come over to extra curricula activities board and we have a thread running for parents of competitive swimmers. It's great for advice and just general chat about how they're doing

@Hellocatshome

Oh, and swimming galas are brutal. You might end up at one allweekend while your child swims up and down for 2 minutes, 4 times, once on Saturday am, then on Sat pm, then Sun am, then Sun pm, while you are watching faithfully and fainting with the steamy heat at the pool.

And even though you are happy they are getting faster you start begrudging paying the £9 per race for you swimmer to swim for less than 30 seconds

Ain't that the truth 🤣🤣🤣

Isn't most club training every morning before school, then some days afterschool and weekend training

@Hankunamatata

Isn't most club training every morning before school, then some days afterschool and weekend training

Different clubs will have different sessions depending on local pool time availability.

My ds does 3 weekday mornings 5-7am and a Saturday 6-9am.
Then 3 weekday evenings. All are 5-7pm and then twice he does an hour land trading afterwards.

They time it so the land training sessions aren't followed by a morning session.

That's much better for him and means we can be in bed at 9pm as required most evenings!

The club he swam at before (much smaller club) often trained 7 until 9pm. Mornings were just an hour from 6 though so it's swings and roundabouts. Plus they only did one weekday morning and 4 evenings. Tbf though he also only trained 10 hours a week compared to the 19 he does now 🤣🤣

Sorry - he does 4 weekday evenings. Mon - thurs

DD's best friend was a club swimmer. She swam 3x a week and 1x weekend. At one time she had to add gym time for upper body workouts.

I think that was the time she decided to quit. They are also expected compete so that's another weekend gone for galas. And the money is also quite a lot.

It's also the reason DD didn't entertain club swimming, too much despite the pool just around the corner from us.

No, sounds OK to me, but if she goes all white and wrinkly I'd cut it down a bit

I used to do swimming when I was a child. I wasn’t even any good, but I had to go 6.30-8am, 4 days per week before school. Two or three of those days I also went in the evening.

I also went Saturday mornings for 2 hours and Sunday afternoon for 2 hours.

When there were galas we could be there for three sessions of swimming in a day - morning, afternoon and evening. We’d all go on a coach, leaving really early and not getting back until after 11pm.

I hated more or less every minute of it.

I am so relieved my children aren’t interested in swimming as even taking them to little children’s lessons made me depressed!

My DD does 5 hours a week at 14- only allows her to compete at county level not beyond. At 6 hours a week she was regional standard.
Trouble is she also wants to do well at 2 other sports and get 10 x grade 9 at GCSE.

It's fine.

I think the actual time training is OK but I wouldn't be happy having every weekend dictated by those timings really, especially Sunday, 3-5 means you can't ever really do a day out.

If she enjoys it then it's fine.

It sounds like she really enjoys it and 4 hours a week at 9 is the bottom end of normal for a competitive swimmer.
I think you may need to have a discussion with her dad about future commitments, like everyone has said it’s not for the faint hearted. My DD swims around 20 hours a week, we are in long course season and there are galas most weekends as they are aiming to qualify for British nationals. It’s not just the time but money as well so you both need to be on board with what future commitments are needed.