Swim Coaching: One Stroke at a Time

Last night, I did some swim coaching, and I think we're getting better at it.

One of the biggest changes lately is that the head coach has given me more latitude to work with the athletes and try different drills and exercises. Originally, I was mostly following the patterns and workouts she had established. We still share videos of different techniques, talk about them through chat, and then practice some of those ideas during our sessions. But lately, she's essentially told me, "You know what you're doing. Just get them conditioned and prepared."

That's a pretty nice vote of confidence.

Last night, we worked on breathing, including three- and five-stroke breathing patterns. For anyone who doesn't swim, that basically means breathing during freestyle every third or every fifth stroke, alternating sides. It takes practice to establish a breathing rhythm that works for you, especially as you start swimming faster.

Breathing is a huge part of swimming. You have to make sure you're getting enough oxygen to keep your body working efficiently. If you don't, eventually you're going to run out of steam. Swimming is very much about endurance, and breathing is a big part of developing that endurance and speed.

The same principle shows up in other forms of exercise, including yoga and Pilates. Strength, muscle tone, and cardiovascular fitness are important, but so is learning how to control your breathing and use oxygen efficiently. Swimmers tend to develop pretty good lung capacity because they're constantly challenging themselves to breathe efficiently while exercising.

We also worked on diving off the starting block, which was pretty cool to watch.

There are several things that have to come together to make a good racing dive. You want to keep your head down, your hands together, and your feet together as you enter the water. A lot of people naturally separate their feet when they dive, which creates a pretty impressive splash—but that's not what you want in a race.

The goal is to create a small, streamlined footprint as you enter the water so you can move through it with as little resistance as possible. The farther you can travel underwater efficiently before coming up, the more of an advantage you can gain.

One of the athletes made a noticeable improvement with this. They started putting their feet together, and while their entry angle still needs some work, they had figured out the key points. You could tell they were happy once it clicked. They had been struggling with the dive for a while, but once they understood what they needed to do, they became particularly good at it.

Those are the moments that make coaching rewarding. Sometimes it's not about making a huge change. It's about finding one or two things that finally make the skill make sense to the athlete.

We also had a fellow lifeguard show us how to do cannonballs—which, apparently, is a legitimate skill worth developing.

In this particular version of the cannonball, the goal was to hit at least three beams of water on the ceiling. He managed to do it on his first attempt. Then one of the athletes tried it and immediately hit two beams on their first attempt. They couldn't quite repeat the feat, but they were clearly pretty happy with their new cannonball skills.

Not every lesson has to be serious.

Another interesting part of this team is that we have a state champion. One of the swimmers is essentially at the top of their age group and category in backstroke. That's pretty impressive to have on the team, and it gives me another useful coaching tool.

When you're working with developing swimmers, it's one thing to explain what good technique looks like. It's another thing to be able to point to someone in the lane and say, "Look at what they're doing."

We can watch that swimmer's technique, body position, timing, and stroke and then use it as a reference for the other athletes. They can try to match what they're seeing and then work on improving it for themselves.

That's one of the things I'm enjoying most about coaching. I'm learning to look at swimming differently. I'm not just watching to see whether someone completes a drill. I'm starting to notice why something works, what small adjustment might make a difference, and how to communicate that adjustment to someone else.

And apparently, I'm also learning how to judge cannonballs.

It's all part of the job.