Swimming

Yoga is a common pastime for many athletes. Although an ancient practice, yoga has expanded exponentially in American sports and fitness. Many claim yoga is effective in improving range of motion, breathing, stress, and even pain relief. Sounds like a total “Win” for swimmers! 

Many athletes enjoy circuit training.  By circuit training, I’m referring to the practice of performing a relatively moderate to high number of repetitions of multiple different exercises in quick succession with minimal rest in between each exercise station.  This isn’t the only way to define circuit training, but it’s a common way and the definition we’ll use here.

Many swimmers find themselves out of the water during the summer. Some avoid practice due to pure laziness without their scholastic coach to hold them accountable.  Others get rewarded with time off after a long build for Olympic Trials, summer nationals, or some other goal meet. Optimal time off (if any) is up for debate and will vary by individual. Because everyone takes time off in their careers whether voluntarily or involuntarily, it is useful to understand the effects of time away and the mechanisms behind performance decrements.

Last week I compiled some age data for the Olympic Trials.  Below are charts listing descriptive statistics of the Olympic Trials fields.  Since these were compiled these before the meet’s conclusion, data was from the psych sheet rather than Finals results. Some athletes obviously scratched, which may have affected the Top 16 averages, but the overall trends should remain similar.  

As intense summer heat engulfs the nation, many athletes complain of muscle cramps.  This post is a sequel to previous posts reviewing the literature in this area. 

Exploring Causes of Exercise Associated Muscle Cramps

Concepts for Hot Weather Training

In recent months, Dr. John has written several articles detailing low pack health and performance.  Read them if you haven’t done so

Olympic Trials and the Olympics bring some of the most tension filled moments in sports: that endlessly quiet wait on the blocks anticipating the signal. The start of every race depends on how fast the swimmer reacts.