Swim lessons from swimming in a meet
Things I forgot how they feel
- Wondering when to warm up and how much to
- What to eat and how much
- How to respond to your results after your race
- How to encourage and what to say to others
- The amount of social battery it takes to be on a team and talking to people at a meet
- The post swim crash after not swimming for a few hours and how you have to hype yourself up multiple times
Things that I never felt before
- The angst of putting on tech suit and how and when to pee (and what do girls do when they have their period?)
- Figuring out my identity and what I swim and what I should or shouldn’t expect from myself
Day 2
- How to shake off a bad nights sleep and know that won’t determine the outcome, how I handle it will
- Why when you ask people how their race was the first thing they say is what went wrong? (Myself included!)
- The 50 free and how it’s all the things. Easy because it’s short. Hard because it’s so precise.
- Attitudes are contiguous on the team, feed off the team when you need it, build up when you have the energy.
- The end of day 2 is legit feeling of relief
Feedback and post swim thoughts:
- My role as a teammate can be to see what you dos well
- I have some feedback when do you want it?
- Or…sandwich it: What do you think you did well?…Now what can you improve on…
- Also, we are in a sport that thrives on improvement. We are going to gravitate towards that. How can we be both honest but efficient?
Random
- How people greet you matters. How you greet others matters. This gives a sense of belonging. (There was nothing like walking in and being welcomed and people excited I was there. And people that give me credit for what I have helped them with.)
- Staying to eat together after competition matters
- Honoring people in award ceremonies matters
My hope from swimming this last weekend was to be a better coach when I remembered what it’s like to be the one in the pool.
The pool that I wanted to swim in from the time I first saw it and Micah swam in it oh so many years ago. I cheered at that pool for many hours and I realized this weekend that where you swim doesn’t matter, who you are with and what it means to be a team…that’s the good stuff. Funny how we get so much more than we give when we are open. I just wanted to grow. And I knew I had to do something more than what I had. What I got in return was a whole lot more.
What else do I need to do this in my life for?
