Seizing Opportunities

Two weekends ago we had the opportunity to race at the historic Yale 50 meter "practice pool." The facilities were adequate, the warm-up space and time was exceptional, the meet hosts were generous and friendly and the schedule of events was ideal. We were given an exceptional opportunity to race long course indoors early in the long course season. This was a chance for our athletes to challenge themselves competitively and begin trying their racing strategies for the season. While we were not blessed with exceptional competition from the other teams participating in the meet, we were certainly blessed with many competitive advantages at this meet.

It was wonderful to see many of our athletes at the meet making the most of the meet. The majority of our athletes took the opportunity to warm-up for the entire sixty minute warm-up session and gain a feel for the long course pool. The majority of our athletes raced incredibly well with focus and determination to achieve best times and learn from their experiences. The majority of our athletes raced in 8-10 events within 20 hours. The majority of our athletes left the meet either with personal best times or with new observations about their approaches to racing which. While the conditions were not ideal, our GMA athletes seized their competitive opportunities.

GMA athletes have also seized their training opportunities over the last week during school vacation. Our athletes who were in town over the school vacation showed incredible dedication to their training. Almost all of our athletes who stayed in the area for vacation INCREASED their practice attendance last week. By all accounts, our athletes who travelled on vacation over the school break found ways to exercise and maintain their fitness levels. I have received reports that our athletes took their workouts to local pools while on vacation to train their normal GMA workouts. We have heard that our athletes spent and hour to two hours each day on vacation running, swimming, lifting and exercising. GMA athletes love to train and keep themselves in shape. They take the opportunity to remain fit, whether at home or away over vacation periods.

As we all return to the pool as a team, I know that we will seize the opportunity to take our training to the next level. We have only one month until our major long course competitions begin. In less than 15 weeks, the long course season will be completely over. Now is the time to get training, get working and get going FAST! Our GMA swimmers have shown that they have the focus and attitude that is required to make the most of their competitive, training and team opportunities!

Carpe diem, GMA!

Laura Matuszak

At Last Vacation Time Is Here!

At last vacation time is here! I am leaving on Friday for a week in St. Lucia with my family (and Merritt) and I will say, without apology, that I am glad to be getting away. I absolutely, without a doubt, 100 percent love coaching and working with the athletes everyday, but I am smart enough to appreciate and enjoy a vacation when it comes my way. I will surely miss everyone, especially the hard workers in Lane Finity or Lane David or whatever they are going to be!

I know that a lot of other folks will be traveling over break and this brings me to my point. While it is great for your attitude and state of mind to get a break from the pressures of your training routine, your conditioning will suffer unless you pay a little attention to it while you are away. I know it seems like a drag to have to think about working out when you are supposed to be relaxing, but consider this…exercise is relaxing! Imaging what your life would be like if you weren’t exercising your minds and bodies each night? How would you deal with social and academic stress? How would you deal with family issues? The work you do in the pool is not only essential for helping you meet your swimming goals, it is a tool that helps you survive the day-to-day in middle or high school. But the big thing to remember is that each day you don’t train, your goals are harder to achieve. Although it may feel good right now to say “I deserve a break” or “One week off won’t hurt me”, the truth is that this is a very important time in long course training and a week off could very well be the difference between getting that cut time, or missing it by a second.

So what am I suggesting? Well, it is not as bad as you may think! By all means, relax on your vacation! Put swim practice out of your mind if it helps you refresh. Don’t, however, neglect your body or your goals. You wouldn’t go a whole week without water or food, would you? Exercise is just as important for what you all have stated that you want to achieve this summer. So, what should you do? Well, swim ideally! If you are near a pool, swim for an hour or more a few times over the week. Laura can give workouts to anyone who wants them if you feel like doing more. No pool? How about running? A 45 minute run combined with push ups and crunches is an excellent workout. Get your heart rate up as often as possible. When you think about it, how much time are we really talking about? 4 hours over the course of the week? Are you willing to commit 4 hours to meet your goals? Are you willing to commit more? I am confident that all of you could answer yes to both of those questions!

As for me? Well, fear not! I will be maintaining my coaching skills while I am on vacation. (I want to meet my goals as well). Merritt and Dylan will enjoy all of the benefits of being on vacation with their swim coach! So pack those goggles GMA and have great break. I will see you all when I get back!

Coach Eileen Hall

Let the Long Course Season BEGIN!

Just when you thought we would have a break from the intensity of the swimming season, we are back to racing again!! The long course season is off to a great start. Our Senior, Sectional and National athletes have had several weeks of great training and are fully engaged in the goal-setting process. Additionally, some of our National athletes competed in a long-course Montreal
last weekend and are on their way to achieving some of their competitive goals. We are so excited to see our Age Group athletes and Clinic swimmers back in the pool next week. It will be great to have the GMA team back together and working hard together to be the BEST we can be!



Enjoy the video clips of our GMA swimmers in their first long course races of the season and I will see you in the pool soon!

Sincerely,

Laura Matuszak

Coach Tim Reflects on the Season

With the all-team practice held on Friday, March 20th, 2009, we wrapped a great season. Our GMA swimmers have worked hard this year and it was fun to see them all have so much fun together. At the practice our swimmers continued working on their goals, worked with each other and just had fun in the water. I was quite impressed with the dedication of the older swimmers at the all-team practice. They taught our younger athletes about their experiences and they shared their knowledge of the sport with the team. In the water, our older athletes provided a safe and fun environment for the team to celebrate the end of a successful short course season. I think their efforts in the pool reflect several GMA core values - to be the best program, not just for technique and training but also for committment and for personal development. GMA swimmers show incredible teamwork. They work together to make each swimmer achieve their personal best with the strong support of their teammates.

Even though the short course season is over, it was very apparent the swimmers are excited to celebrate their accomplishments at the Banquet on Sunday March 22nd. The athletes in my Regional improved tremendously in their stroke technique. They can now roll their hips efficiently in freestyle and backstroke, they can breathe every 3 strokes in freestyle and they can press forward from the chest and core body for their short axis strokes.

During the team meetings this last week, many of the Age Group, Regional and State swimmers were excited about continuing their swimming either through long course with GMA, summer swim team with the Knights or with one of the many other summer swim teams. We talked about the importance of staying active and healthy and of keeping their goals in mind throughout the summer.

I am very proud of the individual and team accomplishments of my group and the team as a whole. The hard work put into the season is very apparent and each swimmer should be proud of their achievements, big and small. It is sad to see the short course season come to an end and it is very exciting to see the long course season, spring clinics and summer swimming on the horizon!

- Tim Bard

Championship Excitement . . . Way to go TEAM GMA!

Wow! What exciting New England Championship meets we have had as a team. We have seen our athletes make incredible time drops, improve their racing skills and display the results of all of their hard work this season. More importantly, we have seen our teammates cheer each other on and become closer in their relationships with one another. What a pleasure to share in these experiences with our athletes!

While I have been totally energized by the enthusiasm and emotions of our championship meets, I was equally enthused by our athletes' efforts in training these past few weeks. Yesterday, we had excellent team attendance. The pool deck was alive with our athletes working hard to improve their swimming and our coaches engaged in teaching the best swimming skills. This commitment to improvement is one of the many things that makes GMA a great team! Thank you coaches, parents and swimmers.

We are looking forward to our final championship meet, the Speedo Championship Meet, this weekend. We are also looking forward to celebrating the season on Friday, March 20th with a special all-team practice and on Sunday, March 22nd with team photos, the Olympic Meet and the team banquet. We have much to celebrate GMA swimmers!

Thank you,
Laura Matuszak

Champs Are Here!

The splash symphony at the pool has had a different melody this week. Monday marked the beginning of the last week of training before the New England 13-19 championship meet at MIT. Team meeting Monday was pretty powerful. Everyone got to say out loud what their meet goals were and after that, they all talked about what they were going to for the team this weekend. We heard many great voices all with really team oriented focus. Some of the best plans came from the crowd in the corner-Jessie, Lauren, Galen, Hadley, Emma and maybe a few others. They spoke up with pride about their plans to come to practice this weekend and stay in touch with teammates who were swimming. It was a great opportunity to highlight the long term team goals that require everyone to remain committed regardless of what point in the season we are in. We did some visualization as well to help to isolate the race in their minds and be able to really feel and see what they are doing!

There has been a TON of energy from the kids. Each day during dryland I have felt an increased impatience. No one really wants to intentionally goof off, but they are all itching to swim! It is pretty awesome. We have worked them hard on race pace and technique, reminding them over and over that they need to have every detail of their race down pat. It takes an enormous amount of focus and the athletes have attacked the challenge! We have also put the relays together to let them practice their starts. Thanks to Laura’s brilliant idea-“Relay Challenge 2009”, there is new motivation to race fast in the relays. There is a pizza party on the line for the first relay team to swim the Junior National qualifying time and there is an added buzz of competitiveness all around.


Tonight was the last night of practice before we set out tomorrow. We used the bands to “slingshot” the athletes for 25 yards, really giving them a feel for crazy speed! First, they had to swim to the end with the resistance band on. (Ok, so the coaches need amusement too!)

I am really looking forward to being on deck with these outstanding kids. They are ready to swim fast and represent GMA. They have set challenging goals and I know many will be achieved. See you at MIT!

- Eileen Hall

February 26, 2009 - Regional 2

Tonight’s practice went really well. We had a really high turnout of kids for a Thursday during vacation week. It's nice to see so many folks committed to coming to practice after many of the kids have had their end of the season meet.

As we were walking down the stairs it was really nice to hear the kids talking about their goals. It was one of our focuses this year was to have kids use their goals more effectively. I think talking with their peers and hearing their goals said out loud from someone else allows them to not only hear more repetitions but reflect and think about what their peer is saying.

We focused a lot on flip turns tonight and the quality of sludk. One of the items we discussed from the regional meet was trying to get kids to do the same amount of sludk but use it more effectively. We had kids sludk consistently past the flags for two of our main focus sets. We do similar things for stroke count so we are now trying to incorporate it into our sludk.

Dry-land went really smoothly as well. We started doing some station work this week and the kids seem to really enjoy having the fast pace between the activities. The kids have enough knowledge about the basic dry-land exercises where we are now able mix up different varieties of activities!!!

Overall it was a great night! - Nick