This is reprinted from the New York Times Sports page. A friend of mine called my attention to this. His coach Bob Kiphuth at Yale was a pioneer in the application of dryland training to swimming. It is interesting to note in the article that they could not put the long hours in the pool because they did not have goggles and the pools were heavily chlorinated.Alan Ford, Top Freestyler in 1940s, Is [...]

Water is an excellent medium that provides unique qualities that athletes can exploit for various needs such as conditioning, specific strength, joint mobility/flexibility, and rehabilitation. What I like about the zealous enthusiast is that they explore all the possibilities that water can do, even if another option is superior. This is important for well rounded programs, as even if a tool or pr [...]

Just to cause more frustration I have posted this video of what's the limit? to share more about Zoology. In this clip we review a special insight to the thought process of excellence and my intent on the first post was to spark some thought about movement as a whole. When I view technique I like to create general motion patterns and a understanding of locomotion in general. Not just humans but n [...]

Here's an interesting quote from USA Today:Look at the way home run production has fallen this season to a 15-year low, according to the Elias Sports Bureau. There was an average of 2.01 homers per game this season, down from 2.04 last year and the all-time high of 2.34 in 2000. (Hello, Barry Bonds.) As a comparison, it was 1.78 in 1993.This season's home run leaders were Philadelphia's Ryan Ho [...]

I have followed this whole swimsuit issue quite closely. Anyone involved in the sport quickly recognized that the suit made a significant difference in a swimmers performance. It was obviously that someone had not done their homework before adopting it as legal or as many suspect there was some hanky panky in the higher levels of sport to get it adopted. Most of the swim coaches I work with descri [...]

As many of you know I am fascinated by sustained excellence. Just the law of averages will allow a team or individual to win one championship but to win 29 straight NCAA Division III Men’s National Championships and 22 women's championships is beyond incredible. This past week I spent three days at Kenyon College in Gambier Ohio. This year I am working with the Kenyon athletic department on sta [...]

I have not been posting as frequently because I am on my annual fall college tour. I started out at North Carolina State on August 28 working with both Track & Field and Swimming. Very enjoyable visit catching up with Rollie Geiger, an old friend and competitor from my college track coaching days back in the Pleistocene era. Then off to University of Michigan for women’s swimming. Then a “wond [...]

I was at the American Swim Coaches Association convention in Las Vegas last week. Obviously everyone was quite euphoric over our swim team’s performance. As usual I have to throw some water on the fire. Let’s not spend too much time patting ourselves on the back for the 2008 performances. Let’s not let typical American naivete pervade our thinking again. Let’s take a realistic look at tod [...]

At the end of August each of the past five years I get to spend three days at University of Michigan with Jim Richardson, the head woman’s swimming coach planning the dryland training for the upcoming season. This is always one of the highlights of the year for me. Jim is a great coach who challenges me to think and innovate. He has done a great job of integrating the dryland training with the i [...]

If you followed the swimming program of the recent Olympics closely, you know that 41 year old 5 time Olympian, Dara Torres, was one of the few female swimmers who looked cut and lean. You probably also know that she achieved unprecedented success for a swimmer of her age by winning a silver medal in the most explosive of all swimming events, the 50m. Dara attributed much of her career longevity a [...]