One of the premier swim clubs in the state of Georgia and the country, Dynamo Swim Club in Atlanta continues to churn out championship results and the top names in the sport. After missing out on the gold medal rankings for Club Excellence in 2018, Dynamo made a resurgence in 2019 and finished seventh among USA Swimming’s top-ranked club teams. Associate head coach Beth Winkowski details the keys to the team’s rebound in this week’s Club Excellence Spotlight.

2019 ranking: 7^th

2018 ranking: 1^st (silver medal clubs)

Number of Current Swimmers: 850 swimmers between the two sites

Notable Alumni: 2016 Olympians Gunnar Bentz and Jay Litherland, former American record-holder Mary Ellen Blanchard, 2012 Finnish Olympian Matias Koski, 1996 Olympian Eric Wunderlich

Current Junior Swimmers to Watch: Tristen Ulett, Rye Ulett, Alicia Henry, Ainsley Jones, Abby Pilkenton, Ian Grum, Cam Auerbach, Kamal Muhammad, Adrian Iannamico

Recent Team Accomplishments: Dynamo placed ninth overall (women), third overall (men) and third as a team at the 2018 Speedo Winter Junior Nationals – East last December.

What are three things that have made Dynamo successful over the years?

1. We concentrate on being a team first – promoting the team culture and atmosphere. We always ask our athletes to invest in one another and each other’s success, as opposed to only focusing on personal success.

2. As a staff, we really believe in teaching before we train. There are a tremendous number of phenomenal coaches in the Atlanta area – we don’t want our practice to look like every other practice out there. We find creative ways to get athletes to do what we want them to do, and make sure that the swimmers understand that hard work is great, but not working efficiently won’t help the hard work.

3. Making sure we’re developing swimmers in all four strokes and underwaters. We believe that over time the events will choose the athletes; we’re not all going to be successful at the 50 free. We want all the kids to be good at underwater swimming as early as possible and try all of the events for their age group. This helps to minimize the feeling or experience of having a plateau.