Tag: swimming

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Coach expertise development – what prompts accelerated learning?

Andy Driska

I recently commented on an article regarding coach expertise development, written by Richard Bailey (“Talking Education and Sport”).  The big question: do coaches move through “stages” of expertise, or is their development completely linear?  Most researchers speculate that development is generally stage-like.

I am particularly interested in the events that happen right before a rapid increase in coaching expertise.  What are the triggers that cause rapid learning to occur?  Some suggestions…

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Psychological Development in Youth Swimmers

Andy Driska

Here’s a great video on psychological development in youth swimmers. The speaker is Dr. Dan Gould at the Institute for the Study of Youth Sports at Michigan State University. I think the discussion of maintaining consistency after races is something that swimming coaches and researchers need to explore. There is always a reason to celebrate a good performance, and it’s important to acknowledge that a string of good races creates a sense of positive momentum in a swimmer’s mind (it can also contribute positive momentum to others by inspiring teammates). However, each race is a separate entity in a swim … Continue reading Psychological Development in Youth Swimmers

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Great Insights at the 2011 Midwest AASP Conference

Andy Driska

Life skill acquisition. Sport and gender. Mental toughness. The culture of high-performance youth sport. These topics and more were discussed at the 2011 Midwest AASP conference (Feb 18-19), hosted by Miami University in Oxford, OH. The conference was heavily student-driven, and included over twenty presentations of research and research proposals. There was a strong contingent of undergraduate presenters… always good to see undergrads getting involved early. I’ll discuss a few of the presentations that resonated with me in my post below. Eric Martin from Miami University presented an interesting piece on passion and burnout in college sports. He spoke about … Continue reading Great Insights at the 2011 Midwest AASP Conference

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Thoughts on Race-Preparation for Swimming

Andy Driska

After spending ten years as a swimming coach, I find it hard to come to mid-February without standing on a pool deck somewhere. I got a question about “tapering” and I thought I would post up some of my thoughts on the process. For those unfamiliar with a taper, it is the gradual reduction of training volume and intensity in order to help induce a super-compensation effect (the body outperforms previous best performances). It is interesting that in other sports, this process is called peaking; the language has a strong, positive connotation, it implies peak performance. In swimming, the word … Continue reading Thoughts on Race-Preparation for Swimming

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Brief Diversions During Training

Andy Driska

An interesting study confirms what many of us already suspect: brief diversions help us to retain focus on a task over the long-term. A five minute Facebook update or a brief walk around the office can help return focus to the task when the break is over… as opposed to trying to maintain focus for an uninterrupted period of time. The researchers suggest that your brain loses interest in stimuli that remain constant. For instance, fifteen minutes after you have put on your clothes, you tend to no longer notice the sensations they produce. What does this mean for athletes … Continue reading Brief Diversions During Training