Poolside chat - new year, new racing!

[Glittertwins]

Hope this works, am rubbish at this!

Wow, what a swim! You need hear the iPlayer commentary at the end too

Not sure where that came from but he absolutely smashed it!!!

We've watched back you tube commentary - is it different?!

Just got in and caught up, excellent swim from Not So Mini Weird @itsgettingweird you must he so proud.

It was the bit at the end when Paul Noble says how well he did

Yeah I think they were surprised at his time as we all were 😂😂

Morning!

When does everyone's regionals start?

Ours start this weekend with relays and then run for following 3 weekends!

Youth (DS age) run the BH weekend as usual so we have a while before we are involved!

Next weekend, then a gap to the bank hol weekend

Ours are two weekends in a row end of April and beginning of May. We’ve only just done the entries as the qualifying window closed last weekend

DS has our National Qualifiers tonight and this weekend. First time ever doing 1500m long course!

Then regionals last weekend in April and second weekend in May.

Good luck to him.

1500m LC is certainly a new challenge!

Thank you, cant help thinking he would be better at it if there weren't any walls 🙈

walls are also my Ds' nemesis!

Probably to do with his dodgy legs 🤣

I think our dates are all different! Regionals ended in March and we are in the thick of Scottish Nationals just now. And it’s so sunny outside the pool!

Always the same! Guaranteed heat wave when we're in the pool all day!
Good luck to your swimmer

Well first LC 1500m went well. A 22 second PB on his converted time and a regional qualifying time. MeansnI have to sit through the torture of a 1500 again soon!

Good luck with those Nationals. We were up in Aberdeen earlier in the week and wandered down to Old Town/Uni. DD happened to be wearing Swim England hoody so we wandered confidently in, passing a Dorset hoody; what a lovely pool you have!

Our Regionals are May bank holiday for the older teens.

Amazing!!!! Not many can beat a converted time let alone by so much!!! And certainly not on their first go!!!

Great he's got a regional time too 🥳

Ds raced in Aberdeen in February and he said it's an amazing pool too.

Sadly really not what you call anywhere near local to us 😂

Well done!

Name changed as I think I've become quite identifiable on here and I would like this post to remain anonymous.

It seems (perhaps with the slightly relaxed criteria for British and English) that more and more of the swimmers at our club are getting on and probably likely to stay on various National lists during this qualification window.

This is obviously very good BUT mixed with usual teenage friendship issues/competitiveness/cliques/dramas is creating quite a toxic atmosphere at our club.

The coaches are not very good at managing this and unfortunately are not helping by swapping the lanes so those on the list are together and those not on the list are separated out.

My child is not likely to make any of the National champs and thats fine not everybody can but does anyone know of any good resources that help put the whole swimming journey into perspective i.e it is not the end of the world and very few actually make a living swimming etc

Show them the current "top" swimmers rankings from their teens.

They weren't making nationals at 13/14/15.

Our club do a change of the way they train. They chose lanes generally for warm up and they swim with their friends. Usually stay in those lanes for tech sets.

But they also do loads of separate training so they'll be split as a session will have LD, form and sprint all happening alongside each other and in each of those 2 lanes they'll be set into groups dependent on if they are all doing same time or different. If all on same time coach often puts them into fastest 2 next fastest etc so each lane decreases in swimmers speed but each lane has a swimmer next door who they can pace with etc.

But other than that their coaches just encourage everyone to train hard and set each swimmers journey dependent on what their next aim is. For some it's regionals and others it's nationals. For others it's going back to nationals.

One of the reasons ds is doing our regionals is for the social side. No one is expecting him to swim well or fast because it doesn't fit into his programme for that. But there's a team spirit whereby DS doesn't feel he needs to excel to be included or for positivity.

But I think it's also easier for ds because no one expects him to go as fast as everyone else 🫣 😂

I understand the frustration. I'd hate for ds to be in an environment whereby achievements outway the training ethic. I guess maybe we are lucky that his club aren't like that?

I don’t know about resources but it is toxic culture within swimming imo. Even at our (small) club the head coach is a bit fixated with swimmers getting to/ not getting to nationals. I mean why? Ultimately it’s just a swimming gala like any other. A lot of it imo is about the coaches’ egos rather than it being about the swimmers and what is good for them. The last person we had who got there swam a terrible race after all that.

The kids have more important things on like school work, friends, for me balance/ doing other sports is also important. What matters is they enjoy swimming, at whatever level and the coaches get the best out of the kids.

But it sounds horrendous, we have no one who is going to get to nationals this year, one swimmer is good enough but he’s been injured. So possibly next year. We also have some really good younger swimmers who aren’t old enough yet. But despite the slight lunacy of the head coach (that I’m only aware of as DH is chair) no one really cares here. I’d look for a smaller club personally it’s a lot more fun.

We have a swimmer (12) who is likely to make first British as age has changed.

Their family have tickets for Olympics.

Coach said "you'd be mad not to go for a swim meet".

I agree coaches attitudes often set the tone. I'm not sure how much that can be changed. Perhaps it's a welfare issue that they can deal with if it's affecting MH of swimmers?

We're definitely going to be off pace this year as last year was rather incredible and unsustainable and training sessions have had to be dropped for school work. Exams and school take priority.

I’m sorry the coach has created such a difficult atmosphere for them, I’m not keen on splitting lanes by what they have or haven’t qualified for, especially as it’s often only a fractional difference in times. In terms of perspective, many talk to them about the Olympic team selections, and how they are taking (I think) 30 swimmers across both genders (and obviously they aren’t from a single age group!) - the odds of getting to that level even if you make nationals are tiny.

I agree with @Teateaandmoretea that coaches can be very focussed on swimming at the expense of everything else, but ultimately they need to have a life too - I’m sure I have said before but I am very uncomfortable with swimming clubs pushing young swimmers pre teens into huge numbers of training hours 10 hours+ a week. Whilst I am sure that gets them medals, qualifying times etc, what does it do for them a few years down the line when others catch up?

@itsgettingweird that sounds like a great attitude from the coach!