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“Show me a piece of furniture built by a carpenter using few tools and no imagination, and you’ll be standing in a flea market.  Show me a piece of furniture built by a carpenter using few tools and an unfettered imagination, and you’ll be looking at a work of art.  Show me a piece of furniture built by a carpenter using many tools and unlimited imagination, and you’ll be looking at a masterpiece that will transcend time.”

One of the beautiful things about the human race is that we are all so different.  We come in all shapes and sizes; stem from different cultural backgrounds; follow different belief systems and see the world through a variety of philosophies.  However even with that great disparity in terms of social and environmental backgrounds, sports are one of those things that not only bring people together, but cuts through all differences we see.  An athlete is an athlete regardless of their heritage and it’s the core of what makes the Olympic Games a wonderful event to watch. 

Even in the world of sports, sports that tend to cater to specific body types have their own outliers or athletes who don’t fit the groove.  Granted some events are very restricted, but in most you’ll encounter athletes competing at the international level who don’t resemble their peer group at all.  Why is that, and what really goes into producing a great athlete?

If I had to compile a list of genetic elements that go into making a great swimmer, it would contain elements from this list:

ü  Body anthropomometry – segment length’s and shape

ü  The physiological engine inside the body

ü  The athletes center of aquatic mass

ü  The athletes buoyancy

ü  The athletes range of motion

ü  The athletes mindset OR the I HATE to lose attitude

The type and size of the engine inside can be manipulated to some degree.  The center of aquatic mass and buoyancy can be manipulated… especially in one of those “techno” suits.  The range of motion can be influenced and in general the body can be managed in a way that produces a better shape and adds more potential to their velocity in the water.   However, the I HATE to lose mindset is one that I find people either have or don’t have.  It’s very hard to instill or teach, and in many ways is a deal breaker.  Athletes can compete without one of the other parts, but they will have a hard time getting to the top of the pile without that single ingredient.  However this isn’t about how to sharpen ones teeth before battle it’s about creating the kind of environment that gives the athlete the potential to be the best in the world.

People talk about Michael Phelps as having the perfect swimming body.  They talk about his tall upper body, strong legs, and an arm wingspan to die for.  Some people are just born lucky right.  I disagree.

It has nothing to do with the shapes and segment lengths and has everything to do with how you use it.  You can have all the genetic gifts in the world, but if you are born, raised or trained in the wrong environment, your chances of becoming successful become limited.  In this article I’ll talk about the trained version since that part implies opportunity. 

We tend to think of sports as being a physical enterprise.  Granted many people have made careers out of sports psychology, but for the most part that side of the equation is all about getting the physical side to the game in the right cognitive mindset.  What we talk the least about is how the physical brain manages everything we do. How it is the ultimate governor that manages all information and is the deal breaker when we approach the blocks on race day.  If the brain’s expectation level on race day meets your goals, then you’ll be a happy athlete.  If it doesn’t, you’ll be crying in the corner or scratching your head as to how things got away from you.

Getting to the pinnacle of success is a long journey.  Even endowed with the right ingredients the training evolution can make or break careers.  So what should that evolution look like?  What path should swimmers or any other athlete follow?  In my mind that path should be filled with opportunities to explore any and all areas that can contribute to their sporting universe.  I emphasize that since society’s educational structure is extremely regimented and the concept of exploration isn’t instilled at a young age.  Even swimming itself follows a learn by rote structure that teaches techniques based off set principles and follows general road maps that have been successful before.  On one hand you have this huge variety of shapes and sizes and on the other you’re trying to fit them into the same pattern of movement.  It’s the square peg in a round hole dilemma.

If you saw Janet Evans swim today you’d think nothing of it.  Straight arm windmill recoveries are common.  Coaches have been teaching that technique to swimmers since the late 90’s.  Michael Phelps worked on adopting it in the summer of 2009 to get faster in the sprint freestyle events.  However she didn’t swim in the 21^st century, this was more than twenty years ago in the middle 80’s and her technique was very unconventional for its time.  I heard many a coach state that if they were her coach, they’d teach her real freestyle and then she’d really go fast.   Her coach at the time had the sense to try and teach her a conventional stroke at young age, but after a few tries thought better of it and let nature take its course.  In my mind she is still the best female distance swimmer the world has ever seen.  If Liesl Jones shows up with a very retro looking breaststroke after decades of the wave technique’s influence on the stroke and smashes the world records, should everyone go back to a retro style?  Should we go back to teaching techniques that evolved in the 60’s?  NO.  The answer lies not in the specific technique or strategy, but in the ability for each kid to find what works BEST FOR THEM.  There is no perfect freestyle.  However, there is a perfect freestyle for every swimmer. Yes they will be limited by genetics, or simply range of motion, but they should never be limited by their environment when it comes to figuring out what works best.

The key is understanding a few very important things.  I mentioned that today’s society is working against you with regards instilling the concept of exploration.  It gets stunted in the classroom and it’s getting reduced in the day to day activities enjoyed by kids the world over.  Video gaming systems are stealing athleticism from our children.  I find it ironic that in a society like America that our kids spend less time playing outside than most countries in the world.  If we add the training environment to this list, it just gets worse.  Not only are we seeing a reduced exploration of athleticism on the play ground, but an unimaginative training environment will exacerbate the ability for an athlete to discover what works best.  Life today is as advanced as ever, however the luxuries come with a price, and in many ways were devolving and not evolving. 

Although we have many thousands of years of genetic evolution on land, we have barely a few centuries in the water.  This raises one of the central dilemma’s that surround adaptation in an aquatic environment.  The brain’s first response to anything is survival based and since we have a limited amount of genetic evolution in the water, exploration in the environment becomes a tenuous activity in the initial years.  If you happen to come from a genetic line that is “heavy” in the water, those initial years have little to do with swimming, and lot to do with survival.

Having said all of the above, THREE steps are critical to giving a swimmer or any athlete a chance to achieve their ultimate level of genetic talent. 

1. They have to become very comfortable just being in the environment (water or land) well before they begin the process of learning how to develop their skills.  In some cases this might very quick for body types that float easily, but for others it might take many months to get there.
2. They have to be given basic balance and centralized body management skills to use as building blocks to figure out the patterns of movement that work best for them.
3. They have to be taught how to explore and how that exploration impacts how they evolve.  In many ways they have to take ownership over how they develop.

Without those three steps in place it becomes a lottery game with regards to achieving peak potential.

A few months ago I was on deck talking with a coach I hold in high regard and he shared with me a story about a swimmer he’d recently inherited.  She was a world class swimmer, had come from a training mill and didn’t know how to think in a critical way.  When asked what she thought about something, her answer was either a blank stare (as in why are you asking me that question), or I don’t know.  This had nothing to do with the academic intelligence of the swimmer and everything to do with the athletic intelligence of the swimmer.  Her toolbox was practically empty, and she had little imagination with regards to what she was doing.   It just happened because she worked hard and her coach said it was going to happen.  In this case the swimmer had exceptional talent and was very good, but in my mind almost lucky to have made it to the top of the pile.  With a lesser developmental coach she might have never made it at all.

Many years ago I’d watch a pool full of swimmers and wonder at times who taught that kid to do that & how in the heck could that kids coach watch that freestyle every day in practice.  It was abominable looking.  Today I realize that we are a combination of genetic gifts and products of our environment.  That we don’t all fit the same patterns of movement and that at times we barely resemble what passes for accepted techniques.  If great swimmers continue to smash world records with techniques that seem out of place or time, then what is the answer to what works best.  More than ever I recognize that the brain’s exposure to its elements makes all the difference in the world, and without that exposure and the subsequent prodding to explore, we’ll never help kids discover what works best for them.