Friday, September 16, 2022
Making This Upcoming Season a Championship One
How would you like to make this short course season a huge breakout one? Could you use a full tank of “high test” motivation to power your training?
It goes without saying that your ultimate success at the end of the season rests largely on the kind of training foundation that you build each and every time that you practice throughout the season. However, it's not solely how much time you put into your training that will determine how fast you go at your bigger meets! It is, instead, what you put into that time! Simply put, it's the quality and consistency of your training on a day to day basis that will determine whether you perform to your potential or fall far short.
And the quality and consistency of your training completely depends on your headset and overall mental approach to each and every one of your practices.
What do I mean by this?
Specifically, when you train, you have to make sure that you are mentally present in the pool! Far too many swimmers seem to periodically just go through the motions when they workout. That is, they may look, sound and act like a swimmer, but mentally, “the lights are on but no one's home!”
Simply put, their mind is NOT on what they're doing and when this happens, the quality and therefore the effectiveness of their training goes way down.
Let me state the obvious: Your season is an incredibly long one and, at this point, right at the start of short course, there are many months to go before you even get to your midseason taper meet, never mind the end of season championships. The length of the season and the difficulty of consistently working hard and staying focused throughout make it challenging for even the most dedicated swimmer. But if you're smart about things, you can use this challenge to your advantage and as a way to separate yourself from the competition.
How do you do this?
In order to lay the foundation for a championship season, you have to maintain your motivation and focus each and every practice! Too many swimmers find themselves running out of motivational gas, so-to-speak, at various points during this long season. They get really tired, bored or distracted. They lose sight of why they're training and instead end up thinking about and focusing on things like “I hate this set! This is a waste!” or “I wish I wasn't here!” or “I'll push myself tomorrow because I'm just not feeling it today!” When this happens, you as the swimmer stop being present. Instead of staying focused on the feel of what you're doing and its' importance to your later success, you are caught up with and distracted by your thoughts. As a result, the quality of your training takes a serious nosedive!
In order to consistently maintain a high quality in your practice effort, you have to have a personally compelling reason to be training that day! You have to have a goal or dream that you desperately want and then you have to continuously remind yourself of that goal or your reason for training hard whenever you find your energy, focus and/or motivation waning! If you can stay aware of what you're doing in your training throughout practice, then you will be better able to catch yourself whenever you start backing down, slacking off or losing your focus. If you're able to recognize when this happens and then remind yourself, “How is what I'm doing right now going to help me get to that goal/dream?”
Suddenly you'll feel more motivated to pick up the intensity of your training.
What is key here is that you need to use your “big enough why,” that important goal that you have in swimming as a daily training tool! You do not want to go to practice without having some awareness of why you should work hard today. When the going gets tough in practice, which it will over and over again, you want to remind yourself of “why” you should work hard right now. In other words, you want to train with an internal sense of urgency to make this set important and therefore as good as possible. This internal sense of urgency will enable you to avoid falling into the common mental trap of giving in to the “I'm too tired right now. I'll do it tomorrow!” Giving into those kinds of thoughts will only deflate your intensity and motivation!
So if you want to make this season a championship one, bring your Big Dream with you each and every day that you practice. When the going gets tough, continue to remind yourself why you should push yourself right now! Doing this will not only consistently raise the quality of your training, but it will separate you from a lot of your competition!
As a Sports Performance Consultant, Dr. G works with swimmers at every level from Olympians right down to age groupers. A popular presenter at coaches clinics and clubs around the country, Dr. G specializes in helping swimmers get unstuck and swimming fast when it counts the most. Dr. G. is the author of Swimming Fast When It Counts The Most, DMTS (Developing Mentally Tough Swimmers), and his newest mental toughness training program, Swimming With The Competitive Edge.
Interested in more tips?
https://www.competitivedge.com/mental-toughness-tips-swimming/
It goes without saying that your ultimate success at the end of the season rests largely on the kind of training foundation that you build each and every time that you practice throughout the season. However, it's not solely how much time you put into your training that will determine how fast you go at your bigger meets! It is, instead, what you put into that time! Simply put, it's the quality and consistency of your training on a day to day basis that will determine whether you perform to your potential or fall far short.
And the quality and consistency of your training completely depends on your headset and overall mental approach to each and every one of your practices.
What do I mean by this?
Specifically, when you train, you have to make sure that you are mentally present in the pool! Far too many swimmers seem to periodically just go through the motions when they workout. That is, they may look, sound and act like a swimmer, but mentally, “the lights are on but no one's home!”
Simply put, their mind is NOT on what they're doing and when this happens, the quality and therefore the effectiveness of their training goes way down.
Let me state the obvious: Your season is an incredibly long one and, at this point, right at the start of short course, there are many months to go before you even get to your midseason taper meet, never mind the end of season championships. The length of the season and the difficulty of consistently working hard and staying focused throughout make it challenging for even the most dedicated swimmer. But if you're smart about things, you can use this challenge to your advantage and as a way to separate yourself from the competition.
How do you do this?
In order to lay the foundation for a championship season, you have to maintain your motivation and focus each and every practice! Too many swimmers find themselves running out of motivational gas, so-to-speak, at various points during this long season. They get really tired, bored or distracted. They lose sight of why they're training and instead end up thinking about and focusing on things like “I hate this set! This is a waste!” or “I wish I wasn't here!” or “I'll push myself tomorrow because I'm just not feeling it today!” When this happens, you as the swimmer stop being present. Instead of staying focused on the feel of what you're doing and its' importance to your later success, you are caught up with and distracted by your thoughts. As a result, the quality of your training takes a serious nosedive!
In order to consistently maintain a high quality in your practice effort, you have to have a personally compelling reason to be training that day! You have to have a goal or dream that you desperately want and then you have to continuously remind yourself of that goal or your reason for training hard whenever you find your energy, focus and/or motivation waning! If you can stay aware of what you're doing in your training throughout practice, then you will be better able to catch yourself whenever you start backing down, slacking off or losing your focus. If you're able to recognize when this happens and then remind yourself, “How is what I'm doing right now going to help me get to that goal/dream?”
Suddenly you'll feel more motivated to pick up the intensity of your training.
What is key here is that you need to use your “big enough why,” that important goal that you have in swimming as a daily training tool! You do not want to go to practice without having some awareness of why you should work hard today. When the going gets tough in practice, which it will over and over again, you want to remind yourself of “why” you should work hard right now. In other words, you want to train with an internal sense of urgency to make this set important and therefore as good as possible. This internal sense of urgency will enable you to avoid falling into the common mental trap of giving in to the “I'm too tired right now. I'll do it tomorrow!” Giving into those kinds of thoughts will only deflate your intensity and motivation!
So if you want to make this season a championship one, bring your Big Dream with you each and every day that you practice. When the going gets tough, continue to remind yourself why you should push yourself right now! Doing this will not only consistently raise the quality of your training, but it will separate you from a lot of your competition!
As a Sports Performance Consultant, Dr. G works with swimmers at every level from Olympians right down to age groupers. A popular presenter at coaches clinics and clubs around the country, Dr. G specializes in helping swimmers get unstuck and swimming fast when it counts the most. Dr. G. is the author of Swimming Fast When It Counts The Most, DMTS (Developing Mentally Tough Swimmers), and his newest mental toughness training program, Swimming With The Competitive Edge.
Interested in more tips?
https://www.competitivedge.com/mental-toughness-tips-swimming/