Summer Swim Team Coaching- tell me about yours

[Anonymous]

Our team pre covid had a very young head coach who had no interest in non A meet kids. He nor the reps ever explained how the A meet swimmers were picked etc. now that all the old meet results are in the app I realized that my kid should have been placed in A meets based on time. But we were clueless at the time and that was three years ago anyway.

Now we have an adult coach and terrific asst coaches. They know all the kids (200 of them) and the head coach speaks to each one after every race A or B meet. It makes such a difference. Most/all of the kids aren’t heading to college scholarships or the Olympics so what really matters is that these kids feel seen by the coach and they strive to get better because they know they matter to the coach.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Worst swimming experience ever so far. Little Falls penguins

Please explain? We have considered joining that pool/team.

Did they switch coaches recently? It's always been a bit of a clique-y pool.

We're going to stay club members bc it's impossible to get in and we're giving up our spot. That being said, we dropped out of swim team and not a single person had checked on on us. My kid went every day for 3 weeks and they still didn't know the kids' names. 15 year old coaches positioned on either end of the pool and screaming at the kids to Swim! Swim! is not good coaching.

This is for nestling/pre team so if your kid can already swim and knows all The Strokes they'll probably be fine. I had gone on with the assumption that nestling's or pre team would help the kids join the team. But what appears to be untrained highschoolers teaching little kids is not the way. My kid can swim, but doesn't respond well to being yelled at.

Wow, we have not had that experience at Little Falls at all and have really enjoyed all levels of swim instruction. Lots of kids are in and out all summer. There are over 200 kids on the swim team so I highly doubt anyone would reach out if you didn't come to practice - they don't expect everyone to be at all practices. If you really have an issue, maybe reach out to the reps or the head coach(es) to discuss rather than post on an anonymous forum.

I'm getting a tone from you that I should not be posting about my experience. Someone specifically asked for details so I gave them. The rep and head coaches DGAF so I'm not going to reach out to them. And, while I'm sure others have loved their expedited, many others feel the same way I do.

m

I’m sorry this happened to you.

Disclaimer — I don’t know anything about the LF program. That said There are almost 90 teams in MCSL and by and large the summer league teams are run by parent volunteers. Some of whom know how to hire a coach and manage a team and some don’t. So some of those teams will be characterized by favoritism, poor sportsmanship, or simply a lack of DEI.

If you want your kids to try the sport — and it’s a great sport when adults do the right things — you could look into FINS or a year round team that has a stroke development group. If you are at LF look at teams that practice at AU or StA
Or Holton (probably SDS). For summer, you can always have your kids swim for a public pool team,
But they won’t have a pre team, so the stroke work over the winter will help

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Worst swimming experience ever so far. Little Falls penguins

Please explain? We have considered joining that pool/team.

Did they switch coaches recently? It's always been a bit of a clique-y pool.

We're going to stay club members bc it's impossible to get in and we're giving up our spot. That being said, we dropped out of swim team and not a single person had checked on on us. My kid went every day for 3 weeks and they still didn't know the kids' names. 15 year old coaches positioned on either end of the pool and screaming at the kids to Swim! Swim! is not good coaching.

This is for nestling/pre team so if your kid can already swim and knows all The Strokes they'll probably be fine. I had gone on with the assumption that nestling's or pre team would help the kids join the team. But what appears to be untrained highschoolers teaching little kids is not the way. My kid can swim, but doesn't respond well to being yelled at.

Wow, we have not had that experience at Little Falls at all and have really enjoyed all levels of swim instruction. Lots of kids are in and out all summer. There are over 200 kids on the swim team so I highly doubt anyone would reach out if you didn't come to practice - they don't expect everyone to be at all practices. If you really have an issue, maybe reach out to the reps or the head coach(es) to discuss rather than post on an anonymous forum.

I'm getting a tone from you that I should not be posting about my experience. Someone specifically asked for details so I gave them. The rep and head coaches DGAF so I'm not going to reach out to them. And, while I'm sure others have loved their expedited, many others feel the same way I do.

m

I’m sorry this happened to you.

Disclaimer — I don’t know anything about the LF program. That said There are almost 90 teams in MCSL and by and large the summer league teams are run by parent volunteers. Some of whom know how to hire a coach and manage a team and some don’t. So some of those teams will be characterized by favoritism, poor sportsmanship, or simply a lack of DEI.

If you want your kids to try the sport — and it’s a great sport when adults do the right things — you could look into FINS or a year round team that has a stroke development group. If you are at LF look at teams that practice at AU or StA
Or Holton (probably SDS). For summer, you can always have your kids swim for a public pool team,
But they won’t have a pre team, so the stroke work over the winter will help

Thanks for the other ideas!