Off Season

We have come to the end of our season and now it is time for every coaches nightmare, the off-season.  I coach at the Division III level where we are not allowed to work with our athletes once the season is over. When I was younger, I hated this and felt I needed to be in control and tell my team what to do or they will go backwards.  Now that I am more experienced and have seen many off-season, I like putting the ownership on the athlete because we are ultimately training for the game of life, and life does not have an off-season, rather, staying fit and healthy takes consistency and discipline.  You won't have a coach anymore.

I think the key's to a successful off-season are taking pride in your conditioning, making it fit, and being yourself.

1.  As an athlete, there is a sport season, but you never take a break from being an athlete.  In other words, and athlete needs to maintain their conditioning, strength and flexibility, and their skills year round.  This does not take as much as most think, but it does take consistent aerobic conditioning, maintaining or building strength and flexibility, and spending time working on drills.  We live in a culture where it is easier to brag about how much we are not doing versus how much we are doing.  Be proud of your conditioning, maintain your strength, and work on your skills.  Even if you do them in smaller chunks than you do during the season, it will make a difference.  If you do the next two steps, you CAN be an athlete in the off-season.


2.  Be creative with your schedule.  I have athletes doing a little of everything out of the season.  We have some athletes fortunate enough to swim with a club, but many are doing internships, or working long hours to pay tuition.  Find a schedule that works and compliments your internship or your work schedule.  Sometimes you may have to get it done in the morning, or at other odd times, but it can be done.  This is a good lesson to learn for later in life.  Eventually you are not going to have a 2 hour time slot devoted to swim practice and a coach telling you what to do.

3.  Be Yourself.  We have our swim-aholics, our cross-trainers, and our triathletes, and there is no right or wrong approach as long as you are working hard and enjoying what you are doing. I have had All-Americans come from all 3 categories.  Bottom line is, there are many ways to stay fit, do what you like to do and be an athlete.  What works for some, doesn't work for others, find something that keeps you moving and working hard and like the saying says "JUST DO IT!"

Common Denominators in Great Performances

We are in the midst of championships season, with a few swimmers still training for NCAA's next week while a majority of the team is done and in the evaluation process.  As I look back on the season, we always have a lot of great swims, but I am always looking for what separates the "JAW DROPPING, WHERE DID THAT COME FROM" swims from the typical end of the year time drops or even an off meet.

Here is what I believe to be the common denominators.  This is assuming your athlete does the work during the season and yes, there will always be athletes that defy the odd's.

1.  All the flowers in the garden are blooming!  The athletes that I see have the best performances have many flowers in their personal garden and they are all blooming.  If you ignore academics, your relationships, your faith, your garden will not be complete.  When we step up to compete, we compete as the complete person.  I have had several swimmers come out of high school too one dimensional, in that life is just about swimming.  This can only last for so long because life is not one dimensional.  Make sure your athletes are growing all the flowers in their garden, and make sure they are all blooming.  You will be surprised how well they will perform in all area's of their life.


2.  The Need to feel valuable to the team!  Without a doubt, the level of importance an athlete feels to the team is critical.  When an athlete feels valuable to the team, they have a much better chance of finding that jaw dropping performance.  This is nothing new, it's the performing for something bigger than yourself concept, it works.  As you watch your team compete during the big competitions, ask yourself, Does everyone feel valuable to the final product?  Some athletes will sense this just by where they rank on the team with their speed, however, to have everyone feel valuable it takes work from the coach and attention to the relationships built throughout the season.


3.  No Fear of Failure! If I look at the jaw dropping performance over the last few years, it is kind of ironic that the athletes that accomplished them are the athletes that would have handles failure the best.    It's not that they don't care, because they care a lot, it is a big part of their life.  I guess it comes back to having several flowers in the garden and realizing this is only part of the big picture, and that sometimes failure is part of getting better and growing up.

Control Freaks

We like to be in control. 

We want the sun to come up as expected, we want our car to start, we want our hard work to show up on the score board or in the pocket book, we want the wind to be at our back, we want our shore lines to remain the same, and we want our weather to do what it is supposed to. 

We desperately want to be in control, yet we see the better team lose, we see the hardest worker lose out to someone who just does enough, the wind changes direction, we see Hurricane Katrina and Sandy change our shorelines.

This past week we had 5 athletes swim faster than they ever swam, get NCAA qualifying times, and not get to go to the NCAA meet because the cut lines keep getting faster.  I think every coach has those athletes that do everything right yet don't get the results they deserve.  How can we stay in control when things seem so out of our control?


1.  Some of the things we appreciate the most are out of our control:  I don't get the chance to surf a lot, but I could surf all day long.  I love being in the big waves and feeling the power of the ocean, the feeling of being insignificant and being at the mercy of the waves.  I love visiting our national parks, and believe it or not, the things we find most beautiful did not come from a controlled event, rather a series of unpredictable events.  Finally, I love watching my athletes get through hurdles that come up out of no where.  My teams that have made the most progress any given year are the ones that have more hurdles to get over, or feel like they have a headwind more than a tailwind throughout the season.  These teams learn more.

2.  We learn more, are more creative, and motivated when we are forced to adapt:  Think back to the most memorable events in your life, the time you learned the most, a time that shaped who you are, when you did something you thought you couldn't do.  Those days were not written down in advance on a calendar like a doctors appointment, they just happened, usually when we were not ready for it.  Many of the best songs, paintings, and performances were inspired by events or sequences out of our control.

3.  It is all part of God's Creation:  The next time you have to deal with an unexpected head wind, it rains on your vacation, or something doesn't go as planned, learn to see the beauty in it.  Because it is not all about you.  Your headwind is someones tailwind, the rain on your special plans is a farmers answer to prayer, and you can still overcome those obstacles and make a difference in your life and the lives around you. 

Be thankful that we are NOT in control.  It would be a boring world.

Psalms 22:28 - For the kingdom [is] the LORD'S: and he [is] the governor among the nations.

Feel Good Moments

Every since I have been coaching at Calvin, it is my tradition to bombard the team with what I call "feel good moments" during the last week to ten days leading into our championship meet.  This goes back to when I had to go to Blockbuster and get VHS tapes and fast forward them to the right spot.


I like to bombard their senses with positive images, sounds, and words as they go into their big meet, I feel it makes a big difference and the team really looks forward to them as well.  It is pretty simple these days with youtube and the internet, we just watch 10-20 minutes of a movie, youtube video, speech, espn highlights, or whatever I can find before we get in the water.  I think the big speeches, the slow motion cheering, the music, the turning point in the movie triggers positive images in the brain, and really helps the atmosphere in the last few days leading into the meet.

Yesterday we watched a classic motivational youtube video that had clips from several different movies tied in with some good music, then we finished it off with a best of Duck Dynasty which got everyone laughing.   We had a great attitude, great mood, and a great practice.  Give it a try.

Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point.
C. S. Lewis

Distance Set

Here's a set that I got great results from this past week.  It was motivated by watching some of my distance group take out their 500's and 1000's a little to strong and in turn fail to stay in control through the entire race. 

The sendoff's and times are from our top group, we did have lanes that were scaled back on the sendoff's with the same strategy.

We did 3 rounds of:

1 X 100 @ 1:10 from a dive
1 X 200 @ 2:15 w/ the 100 pace faster than the dive 100
2 X 300 @ 4:30 the first just trying to stay strong on short rest, the 2nd the goal was to drop at least 15 seconds, as they were getting more than a minute before starting their 2nd 300

We did an EZ 300 in between rounds.

Our top group had to work hard to keep the first 100 between 1:00-1:05, their instinct was to go too fast.  The goal was if their first 100 was 1:00, then they needed to hold at least :59's on the 200, stay strong on the 1st 300, and then put the hammer down on the 2nd 300.

Results:  1st round - they went too fast on the first 100 and couldn't go faster on the 200,  which is kind of what I was hoping would happen, the 2nd and 3rd rounds, they got it right, and we saw some big swims on the last 300 with a couple guys putting up some times in the 2:40's, which is pretty good right now.

Celebrating the Journey

Last Saturday was senior day, and we have a very special tradition at Calvin where we gather after the meet is over with the team and parents to eat good food and have a chance to honor our seniors with stories, and "thank you's" in a public setting.  It always means more when you share things in a public setting.  This is one of my favorite traditions of the year.

I started out by saying something about all 11 seniors, and when I looked down at my list I couldn't help but notice how many things a senior overcomes as they go through 4 years as a student athlete.  Here are some interesting facts about our senior class:

1.  At least 4 will admit to wanting quit after their freshmen year
2.  All of them had a bad meet at some point.
3.  At least half had injuries or illnesses out of their control that   altered training at least once.
4.  Three or four changed majors.
5.  All of them turned down other opportunities (trips, travel) because of their commitment to the team.



This is not what we tell recruits, right?  Here are some more statistics that make it all worth it.


1.  All of them are better equipped for the "Real World."
2.  All of them understand how to be multidimensional, and find balance in their lives.
3.  All of them have a plan going forward, jobs, grad school, weddings, etc...
4.  All of them swam faster over their career.
5.  All of them understand how to gave back to the team.

Make sure you honor your seniors and celebrate the journey because that is what they will remember. In today's world there are so many things competing for their attention.  Commitment is a lost art.  Seniors learn how to get through difficult situations, they learn how to adjust, they learn how to be a leader, they learn how to give back to the team, and they get to see the finished product. 

It is a valuable, life shaping experience.


And, you’ll know you are on the right road when your life looks more and more like Jesus in attitude and action, because He is “the radiance of God’s glory” (Hebrews 1:3). You’ll know that you’re getting up to speed with Him when you see all your relationships and encounters as opportunities to make the qualities and characteristics of our glorious God clearly seen and experienced.

Read the rest of the devotional at rbc.org.

By: Chris. This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 29th, 2010 at 11:03 am and is filed under Devotional, Jesus, Spiritual Discipline. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

Recognizing Fear

I am continuing to talk with my team about our end of the season performance and give them tools to use as they get closer to the our championship meets.  My last post talked about our beliefs and how what we believe is true influences what we can and can't do. 

Fear is also a big reason that we end up coming up short of our full potential.  I don't think that there is anyone that says they don't get scared before a big race, or an exam, or whatever situation life throws our way.  Fear is real, and it is not going to go away, however we can get better at recognizing it and dealing with it so we can have a better chance to reach our full potential.

I am sure there are more, but here are the 4 biggest fear mechanisms that get in our way.

1.  "I don't care anymore," "It doesn't matter," and "Whatever."  Who hasn't said this when it comes down to crunch time, getting the last few reps in, or fully committing to the process.  Unfortunately, this is too easy to say, and start believing when things start to get difficult.  Sometimes it can even be "cool" to act that way.  This is a big fear mechanism we use all too often to take the easy way out.  It is way easier to "not care," than to finish the race the way we hoped to and our brain knows that.  When you feel these thoughts and words coming out, re-visit your goals, understand what your mind is trying to do, and think back to what is important to you.

2.  False Expectations/False Evidence.  This is just using bad logic.  How many of us have heard or used the "I'm not a big meet swimmer, I have a bad feeling, I knew this was going to happen."  This is when we are searching for an excuse even before anything happens.  There have been great performances under many conditions and circumstances.  When you get that "bad feeling," recognize that it is fear creeping in and get some positive thoughts back in your head.  Don't try to use bad logic to talk yourself out of your goal.

3.  What are you REALLY scared of?  A lot of times we go into a situation scared about the wrong thing, which get's in the way of what we really want to do.  For example, the 400 IM is a scary race for most and many swimmers will get to race day and be terrified of the 400 IM and there will be thoughts of "will I finish, I'm going to die, it's going to hurt, among other things."  All of a sudden the 400IM goes from just being a tough race to an unbearable race.  If you look back to all the time spent training, that same swimmer swam many 400IM's and sets in practice that were probably just as painful, longer, and they did them without question and it was not even that big of a deal.  So it's not the 400 IM that's scary, it's the situation.  In this case, realize that you are not scared about the 400IM, rather all the things you can't control.  Have a game plan, and execute the game plan.  Everything else will take care of itself and is out of your control.

4.  Past does not predict the Future.  Don't let past failure OR success dictate what will happen this year.  Just because somebody beat you last year, does not mean the same thing will happen this year.  Just because you swam well last year or didn't swim well last year, doesn't mean the same thing will happen this year.  Every year is different, life would be very boring if nothing unexpected happened.

Recognize your Fears and deal with them.  It is OK to be scared, be strong enough to deal with them and you will reach more of your potential.

Matthew 6:34  "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.  Each day has enough trouble of it's own."