The start of a season is a good time to review some of the basics. And the first one is the role of a swimming parent. I should warn you here that I'll be repeating some points I made in a similar post almost exactly one year ago. Before I start, I should point out… Continue reading 6 Rules For Becoming a Better Swimming Parent
Author: Rick Madge
Here's my life in a nutshell.
Husband to a beautiful wife
Father of 3 amazing, grown-up children.
Electrical Engineer (hey, it pays the bills and keeps my mind busy)
Swim coach (this is where my passion lies)
Attributes: Ridiculously curious. Introverted. Pretensions of creative abilities. Reader (books not minds. at least, not that you know). Athlete (reduced primarily to swimming and cycling now). Collector (of weird, old and interesting items). Writer (primarily of boring technical reports and overly long About You blurbs)
Teens, Sleep Deprivation and Morning Swim Practices – Revisited
Very early last year I wrote a blog post about the above topic. Specifically, that research at the time showed some pretty bad effects on kids, and especially teens, of not getting enough sleep. You can read that blog post here. Basically, it referred to many studies that say teens need between 8.5 and 9+… Continue reading Teens, Sleep Deprivation and Morning Swim Practices – Revisited
How Hard Should We Push our Young Swimmers?
How many hours of training should we put our youngest swimmers through? How intense should training be? When should we ask them to give up other sports and specialize in swimming? These are questions that have been around for a long, long time. And while the swimming world claims to divided on this topic, in… Continue reading How Hard Should We Push our Young Swimmers?
What’s the Best Way to Start Off a Swim Season?
A new swim season is about to start, and in the process of preparing my annual training plan I decided to investigate how other swim teams and other sports team start off their seasons. After all, I've borrowed enough ideas from cycling and other sports that its possible they have some good ideas in this… Continue reading What’s the Best Way to Start Off a Swim Season?
A Look at Slower Second Swims
Slower second (or third) swims in an event seems to be a topic that nobody wants to discuss. After all, since these swims usually only happen at bigger meets, swimming slower isn't something that people want to draw a lot of attention to. But it's part of the process and needs to be looked at.For… Continue reading A Look at Slower Second Swims
Swimming By the Numbers: How Elite Men Swim the 200 IM
It's the men's turn this time. Last week we looked at the 200 IM for women, and determined that it was slightly more oriented towards distance than sprinting, all seem to have strong butterfly splits and much wider split variations for the other 3 strokes, and the fastest tended to have the fastest freestyle splits.… Continue reading Swimming By the Numbers: How Elite Men Swim the 200 IM
Swimming By the Numbers: How Elite Women Swim the 200 IM
After a long delay, this is the next instalment in a series that looks at how the elite swim the 200 by looking at their race splits. This time we're analyzing the 200 Individual Medley for women.It's taken me a long time to figure out how to analyze the 200 IM. When I analyze a… Continue reading Swimming By the Numbers: How Elite Women Swim the 200 IM
The Sad Legacy of East German Doping
Last post I discussed the rise of positive doping tests in the aquatics world (here), echoing the terrible doping decades of the 70s, 80s and 90s. Also, last week, Swimming World published an excellent article (here) about the problems and politics with the testing process. With this post I'd like to close out this unintended… Continue reading The Sad Legacy of East German Doping
Swimming’s Growing Problem
Swimming has a doping problem. And no, this isn't a history lesson about the notorious 70s and 80s. Or 90s. This is now, and its spreading. The issue came up most recently with a surge of recent doping suspensions of Russians, including world record holder Yuliya Efimova, former world record holder Sergey Makov, and now… Continue reading Swimming’s Growing Problem
Wrestling Trip to Hungary
I have to apologize for my blogging absence. Our season ended in early July, and I promptly headed off to Hungary to watch my son wrestle in the World University Championships. For those who are interested, I've now posted 4 of 6 posts describing my / our adventures. You can find these as follows: Part… Continue reading Wrestling Trip to Hungary
Coach Rick - Mighty Tritons Swimming 