Swim squad moves - aibu…

[Kitkat189]

… to expect a warning/heads up before dc was moved from
competitive swim squad to recreational?

Dc moved squads in September, then promptly fractured an arm so was off all sports until mid/end October. So effectively dc has been active in this new squad for just around two months, some of which were obviously spent getting back in shape after 8 weeks off sports.

We just got an email to say dc has been moved to a ‘fun’ hobby squad, going from 12h/week of training, to only five. This takes effect in less than two weeks.

dc will have to say goodbye to good friends, and will be left with a significant gap in the week, which used to be filled with swimming. We turned down other activities to accommodate swimming and can’t rejoin mid season for the others, we have to wait for try outs for September to do those. Also, even if we’d do the new ‘fun’ squad the times and venues don’t work for us as we have other dc with activities and each week is planned down to the minute to make it all work…

Basically, aibu for thinking this was a bit cruel of them? No warning? No consideration of injury & recovery this season? Any swimming families out there who can weigh in on whether this is how these competitive clubs work or should they have handled this differently?

@edwinbear

Yes, it was shit and I’ll still maintain that this athlete was badly treated.

Of course there’s no guarantee that they would have continued to perform at senior level, but given their trajectory (and they still hold national records) a bit of nurturing wouldn’t have gone amiss.

In our experience, swimming can be pretty brutal. If your DD was meant to be doing around 12 hours training per week, I’m assuming she is around 11 or 12. It does seem a bit harsh and short sighted of them. Puberty sees a tonne of girls drop out of swimming, getting rid of them before then narrows that pool even further! However, it may also be that they have concerns about your DD’s general abilities and don’t think she is at the standard. They probably wouldn’t assume an arm injury would impact the rest of her fitness so significantly that extensive rehab would be needed. That said, one of my ADHD kids has low muscle tone and if they are off sport for a while it takes sooo much longer for them to get back to form. It’s even noticeable if they have a week off!

My DS spent some time off swimming with a post viral fatigue. He managed to get back into it, but I’d be lying if I said the club was supportive. I was surprised they didn’t kick him back down a level. In some ways, maybe the harshness is a kindness. My other son does another elite sport, and it doesn’t seem to be at all honest with children that will never make it professionally. That almost seems crueller, as it takes the childhoods and teen years from kids, for a pursuit they can realistically never make it in just by virtue of physical factors outside their control.

I think this is what any competitive activity is like. If they don't make the grade then they are unceremoniously dropped / cut etc.

With several kids, most who did competitive sports of different kinds, I’d think it was normal. I had one who was a competitive swimmer and that’s exactly how it worked. Kids moved between squads based on ability at the time, fitness, injury etc. I don’t understand why your child was even put back in the competitive stream straight away when they returned from the fracture. My experience is they would have been allocated to recreational but the coach would have overseen them there and their return to form assessed and decisions made. It’s not like they can’t ever go back to competitive, it may be never, it may be soon, may be a while. None of it works around your schedule though, that’s no one else’s problem with competitive sports.

Others I have had have had competitive grades for weekend games allocated during the week based on form at previous game and training during week, so you never knew the location or time (and it could mean several hours driving) until 1 day before. It’s hard when you juggle multiple kids and sometimes parents had to rely on other parents taking their kid. Normal for competitive stuff.

I wouldn’t ditch the swimming even if in recreational stream though. The one of mine who did competitive chose to stop as they wanted to compete at another sport that was a preferred passion. It means they now excel at snorkelling, open water stuff etc. We always joke that if they are on a ferry that suddenly sinks they will be the only one that gets to land (if they make it past the many sharks we have here).

My son was super super enthusiastic, first pool side, there at every training session, worked his butt off. Swimming was his world. His coach didn't like him.

The sad lesson my child has to learn was that working your arse of and putting your whole self into something, isn't always enough and doesn't always pay.

Thanks everyone for taking the time to reply

Dc is 10 years old.
Re squad structure: everyone is in the same squads up until a certain level/age (depending on which happens first), after which there is a fork in the pathway to either recreational or competitive. Dc was put on the competitive pathway in September but was promptly involved in a road traffic accident.

Main issue is that it’s been so very little time in this squad, half of which was spent off all sports and also some time getting back into shape. In the recent club champs for these squads he was firmly middle of the pack, not bottom, except for one stroke where he medalled. Not great but also didn’t stand out as being an outlier either.

I know how elite sports work. I was on the junior national team for a different sport myself. Older dc are on team England for their sport, and in vocational training respectively. Swimming dc is also in a team sport in the player development level for a good team. None of the other activities have managed moves like the swimming club has , with a mid season move after only two active months.

I would like to know what their expectations were for these two months, that dc failed to meet? Or if the injury wasn’t taken into account at all I guess it would have been obvious to the club back in September that dc would be moved down due to lack of attendance or not hitting targets. They could have told us back then that this would be likely to have an impact on his place on the squad and we would have known.

I guess I feel it’s been poorly managed overall. They never even replied to our initial emails regarding the injury and recovery, only our third email to say that dc was returning was responded to by an assistant coach. I can live with that but now I’m beginning to wonder whether the higher ups even saw my emails

It sounds like it has been poorly managed, but it’s pretty consistent with the brutality of swimming. Our squad adapted an injury/illness policy from one of the major clubs. It could probably be summarised as ‘we don’t give a toss, no allowances, if you’re not back at form then don’t bother’. Individual sports are probably much more brutal. I won’t cry when we give up competitive swimming.

I'd ask for a meeting with coach. There should be squad criteria on the website. You can discuss the reasons, what dc needs to do to move across again etc. there's such a huge choice of reasons no one can guess what their reasoning is.

My ds is a competitive swimmer. He's come through late compared to the usual age swimmers join clubs and start competing. Didn't join a club until he was 12.

He's still going (20 now) and many of those who were national swimmers and medalists at 12/13/14 have dropped out.

He trains 9 swim and 3 S and C sessions a week and is still improving. So I wouldn't worry too much at his age but I would want a discussion about what coaches are planning for your DS with regards his longer term recovery and competing.

I think there is a huge difference between mid to upper teens (or a corresponding elite squad) and the very first step on that pathway. Coaches have repeatedly stressed that prodigious performance at ages 9-12 or so, corresponds very poorly with elite achievement by the age of 15 and up. If you assess out brutally at the very young stage you might miss out on talent later on. Children go through growth stages at different stages and rates just to mention one metric.

I’m all for streaming in elite sports but there are different ways to do it. Funnily my older dc actually swims for a different , equally competitive club (will quit soon as another sport is more important to her). She had a real plateau for a year, didn’t do well at all, and they were supportive throughout. To my surprise. Can’t move this dc to that club due to friendships and logistics (and trials are in late spring by which time I’m not sure they’d make it as swimming will now be but by 50%)

Is this an opportunity to cross train into triathlon or similar? To mix it up a bit?

I'm a coach @Kitkat189, and whilst it might be different at your club, 'assessing out' would be down to attitude not current speed in one so young.

wow. Interesting thought. As a parent that’s obviously difficult to take in and I have a tough time seeing that in my child, but who knows? Although dc was moved up not long ago, which I assume wouldn’t have happened if there was an attitude issue, and again I struggle with seeing what happened in only eight weeks to change everything…

If he’s only 10 and male I would say you’ve swerved a bullet as 12hrs a week is massively overtraining for a child that age.
Especially in a male as they tend to come through later, due to generally having a later puberty and related growth/strength spurt.

I have a 14yr old daughter that is a Regional Finalist on 6hrs a week. This is her choice, she has a lot of other interests!

If you are happy at the club in general I would stick with the 5hrs a week and see where he is at 12 or so. The pathway for swimming should focus on it being a ‘sport for life’ and enjoyment as so very few will make it to an Elite pathway.

The answers to most of you question lie in talking to your coaches. Decisions to move kids aren’t taken lightly and can be just as agonising for coaches IMO!

Kitkat have you ever seen the long term athlete development (LTAD) documents? It's the process clubs follow and swimmers follow for optimal development. At your ds age they are still (or should be!) training for fun and building the engine.

https://uk.teamunify.com/serbbsc/_docc/LTAD.pdf

Also worth looking up the Swimming ADSP which is based on the LTAD.
10yr old males are still learning to train.

OP I really think it's fairly straightforward.
Had your dc been in the squad for 6-7 months and broken their arm then I could see them working through it. But as you have said your dc has only been promoted in September. Was off until sometime October and then of course required time to get back to full performance.

The club more than likely just thought 'they haven't really been able to keep up so let's leave it a year. Let them fully recover and then restart if able'.

It's such a big step up from rec to elite that it doesn't make sense to keep someone on who has never actually been fully active. It makes more sense to just give it another year.
Your personal schedules don't really come into it.

Just an update to say that we spoke to the club who admitted that they didn’t take injury into account at all. They just noted that attendance for the term was down, and that dc only has five county times at present. Sucks after so many years, so hard to lose friendships etc. It feels difficult because those nine weeks that our child was able to train this term weren’t particularly easy as we had severe illness in the family, plus another really life changing event (don’t want to be specific in case someone from our club is on here and can piece it all together…) which made life very sad for us all. And the 11+ on top which didn’t help with attendance as three exams were on Saturdays so we missed several four hour sessions - not the clubs problem of course but still

My issue now is that the club requires 60 days notice if we quit - but they only gave us seven business days in total (due to the holidays) before the squad move was in effect, so it hasn’t been possible to find something else to do with such short notice. We are left with a 12 hour void in the week and I’m not sure how to fill it. It’s a huge change in our child’s life, and a very sudden one at that.

Thanks @Ivytheterrible and @itsgettingweird I will have a read!

That sounds so tough, OP. We are in a similar boat with swimming. My DS returned from illness, got into a good groove, then developed a severe bacterial pneumonia and is off again. He has been strong as an ox until 2024, but it does feel like it could be the end of swimming for him. It’s not a sport that’s overly compassionate or flexible around illness, and realistically he will be left behind by kids who aren’t spending weeks away or only able to swim occasionally

I meant to add though - why not keep the 5hrs a week. I find 12hrs per week at 10 quite extreme, I don’t really think future potential will be improved by 12hrs per week at this age compared with 5, particularly when he can do other exercise and sport on the side to increase fitness etc.

Hmme, try to see this as an opportunity? I have been in and around several 'national' elite sports pathways and frankly would avoid swimming (and ballet) like the plague.
As a fellow parent of an ADHD child we found martial arts (judo) and a team ball sport (hockey) far more engaging and able to soak up energy as they get older. Anything more cognitively challenging and reactive (technique/game play/fast reactions) basically. Our runner soon looked for other things and both found swimming tedious in the end...