Upcoming Meets
Our first meet of the fall is the Fall Fastival, held at UMBC November 4-6. Some members of our group will not be swimming on Friday November 4th. You will have a written workout that you are to do on your own that afternoon (3:45) at Meadowbrook.

Our US Open group will be traveling to Auburn, Alabama on November 28 for the US Open, which begins on December 1st. Attending swimmers are Conner, Ian, Allison, Courtney, Felicia, and Katie. We’re going to be swimming against many of the USA’s best swimmers from club and college teams, as well as some foreigners. It’s going to be fun!

Attendance
Overall, our group’s attendance has been average. Of course some people have been outstanding, and very few have been horribly negligent…but it’s the little things that bug me. Getting sick and missing a day every once in a while is ok. Having to do a ton of schoolwork during our workout time at some point during the season is acceptable. But how much of this stuff is ok, and how much is too much? Here is a list of some of the “excuses” we come up with, and how to best deal with them:

 

1. “Too much schoolwork & can’t train in the afternoon.” This one is tough to fight as a coach. Of course us coaches want everyone to get good grades. However, this excuse highlights poor time management skills on your part! It is difficult to manage training and schoolwork, especially during certain times of the year. But you are the highest level student athletes in the USA - right? Get a grip on this one.

Solution: get ahead. Do your projects ahead of time, and study for your test a little each day for a week leading up to it. Stay on time with your homework and your daily school work. Most of the time missing training do to studying could have been avoided IF your time management skills over the last two weeks were more precise.

2. “I feel sick.” Another tough one. No one should train with the flu. Stay away. If you’re vomiting, stay away, call me on my cell phone (443-803-2258) between trips to the toilet. It’s nice to know where you are. But seriously guys, sometimes the sick thing makes me wonder. Get over head colds and train. Feeling under the weather? Ok, good luck at the meet when you feel under the weather. It happens.You know when you’re under the weather and when you’re really ill – there’s a difference. Come to practice and do your best when you’re under the weather. When you’re ill, take care of yourself, call the coach, and get back in the water the next day. You’ve got to be really sick (flu) to miss more than one day.

Solution: sometimes there isn’t one. Sick happens. But most of the time, you feel yourself getting sick, right? You guys are getting older and one of the things responsible adults do better than children is address sickness before it gets real bad. Some people have to do a good job with this or they can’t work (& get paid). So take action. Take vitamin C. Take yourself to bed early. Take yourself home instead of the movie with your friends (sorry, you may have to do this sometimes if you want to be good in the morning – and I know, this one’s tough).

Other stuff
Ok, now for some more positive points. You’ve had some great days of training over the last month. Keep it up. Some of the better stats from the last week or so: Nico and Ian went 3:45 & 3:46 for their 400 free’s last Monday – a big improvement from the previous week. Nico also managed to go 3:58 freeIM last week, and Ian went a 2:57 in his 300 backstroke – our fastest guy at this point in the season. I’d like to have 4 guys going 2:54 or under in 2 months, and 2 girls under 3 min, so let’s get to it. Butterfly training has been pretty good overall. Jordan went 23.9 last week in a 50 and 38.4 in a 75; Connor went 26.6 on a 50 fly kick, which was outstanding. Who goes :24? Connor, you’ll need a lot of sleep for that one! Kevin went 4:38, 3:24, and 2:12 on 400, 300, and 200s breast over the last week. We need more guys under 1:10 base at any point in time! Felicia, hey can this girl kick or what? 32.1 LCM free Kick and 28.7 SC Free kick, I think we’re getting somewhere with that. Also we got a 1:02 100 back kick from Flee, 2nd to Courtney’s 101+. Girls, c’mon we need to be under a minute! Courtney also threw in a 307& 306 300 back later that week. Adam has been tearing up previous best workouts times in back and free – 3:09 for a 300 back and 1:51 for a 200 free. Not bad for a guy who’s 200 free best is 1:57. Other good 200 free times: Allison and Ashley finished their free set real strong this week with a 157/156 & 156/155 add up, respectively. We’d like to get 5 or 6 200s faster than that in one workout next month. No, I’m not kidding. Kelly has returned from water polo, and put in more yards this weeks than she has for two weeks before it. We got a 43.2 fly from her and a 53.3 free K 75. That’s a good place from which to jump, right? Speaking of jump, Richard has had zero back hand springs this fall, and as a results is starting to improve his training. His 4:10 freeIM from the other day is a good sign he’s on the comeback. John, another guy on a comeback, has been able to do some more swimming lately, and we’ve seen that he hasn’t lost any speed. Stay with it John, you’ve been pushing 24+ for free – why not 48s at the end of the winter? Speaking of end of the winter, the Hammer is ahead of schedule training the heck out of his mile pace right now – 1:54 city for 200s the other day. Let’s turn those into 1:51s and then we’re really talking. Katie turned in a 4:39 400 breast this week, as well as a 1:57.1 200 IM – and backed all that up with PR kicks for back and free 50s and 100s. And Shaun, Shaun, did you think I’d forget about you? Never Shaun,c’mon, we go too far back. I really liked the 54s (10 to be exact) from last week’s freestyle set. Coming home in a :54 would be nice, eh? I’m not talking about the 200 free…keep up the fast stuff guys, and toss the slow stuff. We’re in a game of tenths- Be tough & train to win!