World Class Parents

”So, you want to offer your child the opportunity to be a world-class athlete….”
By John Leonard - Executive Director of the American Swimming Coaches Association.

If the above sentence doesn’t scare the bejeezus out of you as a coach reading it, good for you!

The fact is, a number of parents DO, without being raging lunatics, wish to offer their child the best possible chance to be a great athlete….in the same way that they’d like to offer them the chance to attend the most prestigious University, visit the best doctors, be a world-class musician or artist, etc. etc. etc.

The key word is “OFFER”. Not “force”. Not “Make”.  Offer. The issue, if you take the words “world class” out of there….is that MOST parents want to “de-limit” their children and “offer them the chance for the best opportunities in life.”.  Put that way, it doesn’t sound so bad. In fact, it sounds like “most of us”.

As every coach knows, the devil is in the execution. (or the details, if you prefer.)
I was asked this question twice on a recent trip to Africa…..where the topic came up because of the perception that African children who aspire to be swimmers are considerably limited  on their continent. Overall, I thought it a fair question.  Here’s my answer….I’d love to hear other people’s thoughts.

#1.  It’s all about the coaching.  Led by the great researcher, Dr. Anders Ericsson, we know that expertise comes from 10,000 hours of focused, purposeful practice, guided by a “coach” of skill, knowledge and understanding of the learning process providing top quality feedback. So the number one task of the parent on the track of great opportunities….do your homework, research the coaches available to your child, spend time in conversation with them, reach a mutually satisfying understanding of “who is doing what” and then get out of the way, and TRUST THEM to do right with your child. You can “oversee the process” but let the coach, Coach.

That’s answer 1, 1A and 1B…..nothing else comes close in importance.  Here are a few other ideas, however.

#2.  It’s about RESILIENCE!  Your child, all children, are going to hit some rough patches in their development. Teach them to persevere, don’t get the roadblocks out of their way FOR them, let them learn to struggle with it and overcome. Everyone gets knocked back/down. The child has to get good at getting back up…ON THEIR OWN.

“Curling parents” are those rushing down the path ahead of the child, trying to clear every obstacle out of the way for them……and never letting the child gain the satisfaction of overcoming challenges. Don’t be one.

“Helicopter parents” are those who hover over their child at every moment, so intent on making sure the child “gets it” that they become the biggest distraction to the child ever “getting it”.  Go sit down. Relax. Read a paper. When the child’s done, love them, don’t make them replay every moment of practice for you. Don’t be one.

#3.  It’s about personal responsibility. Make sure you teach your child that “if it’s to be, it’s up to me.”  If they want to be a world class athlete, only their effort will take them there. Effort. Not talent. Tons of people have talent to achieve great things. Few do. Often because their proud parents forgot that effort is the only way to achieve.  Teach effort.

#4.  Be a Motivation Machine. As the great swimmer Michael Phelps was on his steady, effortful rise to the top of the swimming world, his coach Bob Bowman described Michael as a “Motivation Machine”. Something good happens, he got up the next morning with the mind-set, “I want more of that.” And he went off to practice. (not staying in bed congratulating himself..”I earned some more sleep this morning…I’ll sleep in..”) When something Bad happened, Michael got up and went to practice with the mindset “I’m NEVER letting that happen again”. (not staying in bed and having a mini-pity-party.) One of the greatest things I have ever heard that separates a great individual from the rest of us….Be a Motivation Machine.

Parents, you can teach that to your child and it will be a life-gift of importance.

#5. ENJOY THE RIDE! The Chinese have a saying…”most of life is about Chop Wood, Haul Water”. Mundane tasks that are essential to our progress in life. Life is not always wildly exciting and “ fun”. Mostly, it’s steady mundane effort and work. So learn (both as a parent, and teach to the child…) to enjoy and be very “satisfied” with the day to day tasks that, like water impacting the rock, make up our journey towards

Marlins April Home Meet

Not too bad of a turnout for what could be described as not the most ideal weekend for a meet. Still 62 swimmers participated, about double the amount of swimmers from last year, and we welcomed 9 kids who participated in their first meet ever. Everyone was a bit nervous but stepped up to meet the new challenge presented to them. Congrats to Ashley and Mack Blood, Harrison Flynn, Nick Ginwala, Rachel Katz, Morgan Mutscheller, Jordan Price, Haley Summers  and James Worthington.

A 48% best time is well below average, and we owe this relatively weak performance to our older swimmers who were swimming a bit tired. Could be the 30,000 yards a week they are swimming or the difficulty to get fired-up during this kind of competitive format ... at least not all is lost, these athletes still put a pretty good show for our younger kids to watch. In Particular, the following swimmers had a great meet: Jude and Belen Mirsky, Lani Kamler, Sienna and Nick Berry and Ella Biesiadecki.

All in all a good event that hopefully got our new families to learn a bit more about the sport and our older one to have some time to catch-up. Looks like Bobby offered a good alternative to our snack bar. I am thinking about passing the job on to the RRC kitchen from now on. I welcome your feedback in this area.


While not swimming close enough to their best times, our older kids managed to break 2 team records. Alicia Vogelaar, Emma Jones, Justas Reskevicius and Jared Sears broke the 13 and over mixed 200 free relay record and Alicia, Emma, Jared and Alex Claman broke the 13 and over mixed 200 medley relay record. Good job!

Next on the Marlins schedule is the long course meet in Vallejo on May 6,7 and 8. So far we have 14 swimmers attending and the meet is schedule to close on 4/28 or earlier if enough swimmers enter the meet.

On May 13 and 14, all our high schoolers will be competing for their respective high schools in their league championships. We will be preparing our athletes to perform as best as they can for this event. A week later those who qualify will get to compete in the North Coast Section High school championships.

In the meantime, the next meet open to everyone on the team is schedule for Saturday, May 21 at the Tiburon Peninsula Club and will be hosted by NBA. I recommend this meet for all the swimmers. This is very much like our home meets. The meet will be open for registration shortly.

I have officially closed our Spring session schedule to end on 6/10. I will still consider accepting returning Marlins swimmers to the team, but all new swimmers will have to wait until the beginning of the Summer season on June 13.

Marlins News - Monticello / Napa

Jeff and I took 22 swimmers to Monticello High School in Napa for our first meet in this venue. What a treat!

Great weather, gorgeous pool. See the picture below,

and a really fun format getting the kids to swim 5 events in one day. Although we had some technical difficulties with the timing system which lengthened the meet by almost 2 hours (that's a lot!). I felt it was still a good meet, so much so that we will be returning to that same pool on August 6th for the same meet.

Overall, the Marlins swimmers did a great job. 102 races with 9 disqualifications and a 62% best time. We could have avoided a few DQs, but otherwise the races were pretty clean. Every swimmer but one improved at least one race and in the process two of them managed to break another 3 team records. Bringing the total team record broken for this season alone to 40!

Congratulation to Coco Berkenfield (9-10) for 2 new team records in the 50 back and the 50 fly and to Ava Salmi (13-14) for breaking a 9 year old record in the 200 free.

Coco managed to earn another JO cut in the 100 free and a Far Western cut in the 50 back, also Ian Chow-Ise swam his first JO cut ever in the 200 free. Anika Berde, Jack Berkenfield, Ian Chow-Ise, Erin Hensley and Lani Kamler all contributed to a total of 8 new A times that day.

Since this meet was a pentathlon, it was scored on the result of each events, ultimately rewarded the most well rounded athlete in the pool. Coco Berkenfield managed to get the High point award by winning all 5 events and Ava Salmi tied for the same award in the 13-14 age group category.

We had the opportunity to watch Chloe Isleta (11-12) who happened to be at the meet. It is a random event as she is currently the best swimmer in the country in her age group. We all got treated to a solid show of great strokes, turns and transitions at a blazing speed. Humbling, but exciting as well.

Thank you again for all the parents who helped during the meet.

Good Job.

Far Westerns Championships

We just returned from the Far Western Championships in Morgan Hill where Jeff and I took 4 swimmers to compete over 4 days of competition. I was expecting a strong performance and alas it didn't happen. Unfortunately, I cannot find blame anywhere obvious (the plot thickens) and I am filling away a whole bunch of info that may make sense later.

Monica Sears had a tough meet which started with a problem with her race suit in her 200 free. She missed a best time by 1.7 seconds and recovered nicely in her following race, the 100 fly where she posted a best time and a new team record. The following day she swam the 200 IM and although she was 3 seconds ahead of her personal best half way through the race, she wasn’t able to maintain the intensity of the swim and fell back a bit to miss a best time by half a second. On Saturday, she swam the 500 free. We all had great hopes as she was seeded 8^th in prelims and stood a good chance to qualify for finals. Unfortunately after the second 50 she was already off pace and never recovered. She finish that race 8.5 seconds behind her best! Two hours later she dives in for her 100 back and somehow pulls off a best time by half a second and break another team record. Talk about highs and lows! Finally, Sunday arrives and her first race is the 50 free, she stood a good chance to improve, and she did, not by much, just one tenth of a second, but that was enough to break the third and last team record of the meet, a record that stood for over 10 years. Fifteen minutes later she dives in for her last race of the meet, the 100 breast. By now she is pretty tired, physically and emotionally and she falls short of her best time by 2.6 seconds. Throughout this whole meet she maintained her cool, sure she was bummed about her slower races, but she kept attacking each one as if they were her first.

Jared, her brother, swam the 200 back with a great improvement on his transition. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to get a best time. Two days later he raced in the 100 back and raced slower than he did back in July of last year. It happens, even with hard training, sometimes it can go bad.

Tyler Welty was there to improve a race that he had done 2 weeks earlier, the same race that got him qualified for this meet. He fell short of his goal by three tenth of a second. I could blame his turns (and I could be right) but all in all he swam a much better race this time. It was well paced and he finished strong.

Aidan Cumming qualified in the 50 breast like Tyler, two weeks before. But unlike Tyler, he had to change his dive, his pull down, his kick and his glide. How did he qualify for this meet in the first place? That’s how much raw talent is in this kid. The cool part is that he did change his dive, lengthen his glides, cleaned up his pull down and manage to fix his kick, at least for the first half of the race. And yes, with all that he did get a best time.

I usually do not ramble about the specific of each race, but I felt there was a good story behind the numbers. 36% best time was just not giving the whole picture. Anyways, good job to all of you, and a big thank you to your parents for the support they afforded you.

Junior Olympics

Seven swimmers attended the 2011 Junior Olympics Championships in San Ramon. With very hard conditions on Friday and Saturday (lots of rain, wind and cold) our athletes had a tough job. To spice it up, a record number of swimmers qualified for the meet, bringing the total number of teams attending to 102 and the number of swimmers over 1500! This made for very crowded warm-up / warm-down lanes and a confusing meet happening in 3 pools at once that made keeping track of everything a bit challenging.

But the Marlins managed, and with slightly above 50% best times, everyone getting at least one best time, 5 new team records and 2 new swimmers qualifying for Far Westerns in 2 weeks, we can say that it was not bad at all.

Congratulations to Aidan Cumming and Tyler Welty who both got their first qualification to the Far Western Championships scheduled in 2 weeks in Morgan Hill. Aidan qualified in the 50 Breast and Tyler in the 100 breast.

Congratulations to Coco Berkenfield and Ava Salmi for breaking a team record in the 9-10 100 back and the 13-14 100 breast, respectively, (both 10 year old records!), to Monica Sears, Tyler Welty and Jared Sears for improving their own records in the 11-12 500 free, the 13-14 100 breast and the 15-16 200 free respectively.

Good Job to James Beard, the youngest boy (11) for putting up with the weather and the cold and still improving both of his events.

Parents, thank you for the support. Jeff and I are greatful for it.

Marlins News

Considering the time of the year, the weather was pretty good for our first home meet, even if it was a bit cold for the second half. 60 swimmers participated, about 1/3 more than last year, and we welcomed 14 kids who participated in their first meet ever. Everyone was a bit nervous and I probably didn't help much by adding events to most of them. Still in the end everyone did a great job. Congrats to Cadence Ayoubpour, Bennett Barsotti, Mac Berry, Malia Chendo, Lindsay Eiseman, Ada Huttula, Sophia Lindsay, Alexander and AnnaLea Sreba, Lauren Surtherland, Aidan, Spenser and Haley Thompson and Noa Zimmerman.

A 62% best time is pretty good, considering that 25 and 50 yards event are a bit harder to improve. All in all a good event that hopefully got our new families to learn a bit more about the sport and our older one to have some time to catch-up. Still, I would have rather like to spend my time supporting and coaching the swimmers instead of starting the meet. Next time some of our more experienced family may want to step up.

Next on the Marlins schedule is the Junior Olympics Championships in San Ramon where 8 our swimmers will be competing over 3 days (3/18 to 3/20).

Do not forget our swim suit try-on. Reed from Norcal will be here are the pool from 4 to 6:30 pm on Tuesday, March 22nd. He will be happy to help you size the suits for your kids. He will also bring goggles and will be happy to deliver any purchases if you give him enough time (and the item is in stock).

The Monticello swim meet in Napa on April 9th is still open. So far we have 13 swimmers attending. It is a meet recommended for all our swimmers as long as they have at least one home meet experience.

Marlins News - Napa

Last weekend was the Napa meet. Although I witnessed some of the coldest temperature by pool side before warm-ups, I can still say that we got lucky. The kids were ready and prepared to handle the cold for the most part, and it seems that the conditions were not too distracting.

17 swimmers participated over 2 days of competition. We had quite a few kids sick or recovering from being sick so that explains the low percentage of swimmers who improved at least one event. Two disqualifications only, but both could have been avoided  (and both swimmers know it). Still a 50 % best time, 14 new races never perfomed before and 2 team records, make this an overall good meet for the team. Unfortunately, this was the last chance for our swimmers to qualify for the up-coming Junior Olympics Championships and even if a few kids got really close, no one added any events to the current roster of JO qualifiers.

I should mentioned the 2 team records broken over the weekend. Coco Berkenfield (10) broke a team record in the 200 back, it was her first time swimming the event and she took the record away from Sarah Dunn, one of our fastest Marlins swimmer who still hold many records. Also Tyler Welty who improved his 100 breast a bit and broke his own record set back in December. These 2 swimmers helped bring the total number of records broken to 29 since September, surpassing last years total records by 2 ... with 6 months to go before the end of the season. I can hardly wait!

Good job to all and a special thank you for all the parents who help time during the meet, and an immense gratitude for Theresa Kamler who worked as a stroke and turn during the meet.

Marlins News - Vallejo

We just finished our first meet of 2011 after 6 weeks of practice since the winter break. We did not do any specific preparation for the event and treated it as a practice meet. No surprisingly, the majority of the 18 swimmers who participated in the meet performed as expected. Over the weekend, the swimmers improved 49% of their events, well below our 60% average for meet, but no one was really off their best times by much and that is a good sign. Another good sign is that out of 100 races, the team only collected 2 disqualifications.

What was surprising, was the fact that four swimmers collected a total of ten new team records! Congratulations to Coco Berkenfield (9-10) for her performance in the 50 fly, Lizzie Ferguson (9-10) for breaking an 11 years old record in the 500 free, Monica Sears (11-12) for breaking six team records in the 200 free, 500 free, 100 back, 100 fly, 200 and 400 IM, and Jared Sears (15-16) for his performance in the 1000 free and the 400 IM.

Less surprising but still worth noting, is the performance of the Coco Berkenfield and Aidan Cumming who added 3 new Junior Olympics times each, Lizzie Ferguson, Justin Jo and Annalise Schlafer who added one "A" time each, and to Monica Sears for swimming a Far Western time on her 100 fly, and getting three "PRTs" Pacific Reportable Times in the 100 back, the 200  and the 500 free.

Big thank you to Judy Ferguson and Theresa Kamler for officiating during the meet.

Marlins Away Meet Check List

     1.    When you get to the meet, you must:

a.    Have your child check-in for every day of the meet. The athletes must check themselves in. The clerk will circle the events for the day, or ask the swimmer to do it and the swimmer will initial next to it. Pre-seeded meet do not require check-ins.

b.    Find the team area and set-up with your team.

c.    Have your child check-in with the coach, at which point the coach will go over warm-up procedures and any specifics for the meet. If your child is young and the weather is on the cold side, the coach may advise him or her to skip warm-up all together.

d.    No events should be modified before clearing it with the coach first.

e.    Be ready for the team meeting schedules 5 minutes before the end of the scheduled warm-up.

f.  All swimmers must wear their team caps during warm-up and also during their races.

2.    Show your team spirit: Swimmers should wear Marlin’s paraphernalia like cap, suit, parka, sweats, T-shirt, etc. Remember to cheer for your teammates!

3.    Help your child learn their competition routine:

a.    Check their Heat and Lane assignment (if relevant). Heat / Lane information is posted around the pool or can be found directly on the program if the meet is pre-seeded.

b.    Check–in with appropriate coaches to let them know their seeding assignment and get a word of encouragement and a technical reminder. Be patient, coaches have to watch races, talk to swimmers before and after their races. They may not be ready when you are; this is why you want to give yourself some extra time to check in.

c.    Line up to swim and make sure the timers have your name on their clipboard, swim the race.

d.    Warm-down (double the distance swam in the race if it is 200 yards and above, or triple it if it is 100 yards or less) if space is provided.

e.    Check-in with appropriate coaches to hear feedback on your race, times, splits, pointers, acknowledgments.

f.     Go drink and eat! Let go of the last race and prepare the next.

4.    Parents, help your child stay at the meet as long as you can to reinforce the fact that any competition is a team event. Get involved in the running of the meet by timing or becoming an official. Avoid coming for your child’s one race and leaving 5 minutes after it’s over.

5.    What to do when your child gets disqualified. Disqualifications “DQs” are part of swimming; this is the other way your child’s performance is judged other then with a stopwatch. Rules are designed for purposes such as fostering fairness amongst the competitor, allowing order and smoothness in the running of a meet and protecting the integrity of a stroke against the ever-evolving interpretations of the swimmers and their coaches. Sooner or later your child will be “DQed”. When this happens, remember that this is part of the learning process. The Stroke and Turn Judge will meet the swimmer behind the block and will hand him a yellow sheet while explaining the reason for the DQ. You are encouraged to listen and make sure your child understands the nature of the mistake. The coach will go over all the details to make sure that this “incident” turns into a learning opportunity. Parents and coaches are not allowed to argue the merit of a DQ directly with the judge. If necessary, a protest can be filled by the coach with the Referee who will investigate the call made by the judge. Often your child will be upset. Remember to offer your support and let the coach do the coaching.

6.    Pick up your awards at the end of the meet when possible.

7.    Clean the team area; leave it as clean as you found it.

8.    Check in with your coaches when you leave the meet, even if it’s just to say goodbye. Don’t leave the meet until you know if your are on a relay or not.

9.    Parent’s code of conduct: Swim meets are an important part of the sport experience. It is also the one-time parents, coaches and swimmers come together to make the event work and to help it be successful. Each has a specific responsibility, which do not overlap.

The child’s job is to showcase his/her knowledge and experience acquired during practice sessions and other competitions, while having fun. It’s also to reach goals he/she has set for himself/herself as well as socializing with his/her friends.

The coach’s job is to facilitate the experience by sharing his/her expertise, by putting things in perspective and giving an unbiased opinion of the athlete’s performance. The coach’s job is to use the opportunity competition provides to reaffirm and / or redefine goals for each athlete, each training group and the team as a whole.

The parent’s job is to provide unconditional support and love to the athlete. Also to allow the athlete to mature by creating the space needed for him/her to grow. The parent’s job is to assume there is always a certain amount of pressure put on the athlete during competition, and that they should be careful not to add to it.

a.    8 & Under: At this age, it is the parent’s job to help their kids learn about the running of a meet. Don’t expect the coaches to run around looking for your children because they simply can’t. Bring your child to the coach, run them through their competition routine until they know it by heart. Parents should teach their children how to best utilize their coach, they should also help the coach better understand their children by communicating with them.

b.    9 – 12: If your child is new to swimming, you may want to follow the recommendations for the younger swimmers. The goal is to make sure the athlete is doing what needs to be done while helping them less and less as they get older. This means that sometimes parents may want to let the athlete suffer the consequences of a mistake in order to best learn from it.

c.    13 & up: By this age, the athlete understands their expectations at a swim meet … but parents are not off the hook yet. They still need to make sure that there is good communication between their child and the coach.

What to bring to a swim meet? Dress warmly; you can always take layers off if the day turns out warmer then expected. Pack at least 2 towels, swimsuit, cap, goggles, warm socks, sleeping bag, and extra clothes. Don’t forget to write your name on all your belongings so that they can be returned to you when found. Bring homework; reading, cards, and travel games … last but not least, healthy food that will keep your body fueled throughout the entire meet.

Remember: If you are new at this, more experienced parents will be delighted to help you out, they all remember being a little confused at the beginning too!

Drinking Enough Water?

USA Swimming is has just revamped their website and has made it a lot easier to use. The problem is that there is so much information that it wasn't always clear where to find it. I do encourage parents to check it out since it offers a great source of general information about the sport. There is even an area specifically dedicated to parents like you and giving you access to lots of different topics.

As an example, please read this excellent article on practice and water drinking (which the kids rarely do well enough - even the ones who bring water bottle at swim practice).