** Please note, there will be NO Saturday 1-2pm squad session at Claremont Pool on Saturday 7th May owing to the Busselton Half Ironman event. The session this Saturday (30th April) will be running and I'd love for you to attend if you can! **
Hope you are all well and had an egg-cellent Easter Weekend - sorry, couldn't resist!!! ;-)
In this newsletter we will cover: the new Winter Squad List; May Coaching Cover & PAYG Card Instructions; and Future Trips. Whilst a little longer than usual, please take the time to read this newsletter as it contains some very important information about the winter program and a personal cheque for $1million....
...OK, so the last part was a little fib! ;-)
Winter Squad List:
Thanks to everyone who promptly completed their Winter Squad Application requests. You can now see which sessions and which lanes we have booked you in for over the winter period commencing Monday 9th May to Sunday 2nd October:
If any of your details appear to be incorrect, please let Francene know on francene@swimsmooth.com
A few things to remember:
- You are NOT committed to having to attend every single session, every single week. The purpose of asking you for your requests is to ensure that the lane space is managed as best as possible to avoid over-crowding. Undoubtedly there will be days over the winter when you would rather roll over in bed and stay nice and toasty, but be assured that we'll always be down there come rain, hail or shine (just not severe thunder and lightening storms when the pool has to close!) and so there will be plenty of motivation to stay fit over the winter!!
- Given that we offer maximum flexibility by offering payment on a PAYG basis, we have built in a "Buffer List" for each lane. If you are listed on the Buffer List you can still attend the session. Ideally we'd have 8 to 10 swimmers per lane. Some sessions there might be only 4 or 5 swimmers per lane, but equally we have to try and offset this by offering a buffer of 3 or 4 swimmers so that on occasion the lanes might be a bit busier, especially on fine mornings. Hopefully this all works out in the "wash" for everyone and is fair and reasonable, in fact even at the peak of the summer, I can only recount 3 or 4 total sessions where the lanes did get a little squishy with ~11 swimmers per lane, so not bad going for a PAYG system. It's all about good management and your help in completing the online application form has been of massive use to us in this regard - thank you.
- Swimmers whose names are listed in italics are those of you who have informed us that your attendance is likely to be a little sporadic over the winter due to business or holiday trips.
- Swimmers listed on the Red Reserve List are NOT yet permitted to attend that particular session. We have given priority to those whom have been attending regularly and consistently over the last couple of seasons, so I do apologise if you've missed out for the moment. We have added your details in the order in which you applied and will be in touch directly as and when space opens up. Thanks for your patience at what is proving to be a surprisingly popular time.
- Please make a note of which lane we have allocated for you per session as due to both the amount of lanes we get and also the variability in ability levels within the squad, you won't necessarily always be in the same lane. By sticking to your lane (at least in the warm-up) this will help the coaches run the session nice and smoothly and will help to improve your own enjoyment of the set by being in the right lane for your speed.
- I have also detailed the typical pace per 100m or cycle time per 50m at the top of each lane allocation for each session. This information is mainly for the coaches using the Wetronomes but to simply show you what approximate pace you should be aiming for in that given session allowing for some sessions being harder than others. The Wednesday session features a cycle time per 50m - the difference between this and a pace per 100m time is that the cycle time actually includes your rest time as well, i.e. the faster you swim, the more rest you get. The pace per 100m time is that actual pace I'd like you to swim and will typically work as one beep recovery between each interval.
- We have decided to NOT cancel any of the Summer Sessions, at least not at this stage. We plan to see how they go over the first month of winter and make any adjustments as necessary. This means the Monday 7am session, the Tuesday 6.30pm session, Wednesday 5.30am session and Saturday 1pm session will all still be running (see http://swimsmooth.com/perth_timetable.html ). The Monday, Tuesday and Saturday sessions will all be reduced to 2 lanes (given the expected lower numbers) with the ability to go to 3 lanes if we absolutely need to. If you think that you might like to attend any of these sessions knowing that they'll still be running, please let Francene know at francene@swimsmooth.com
May Coaching Cover & PAYG Card Instructions
As you know I will be away from Perth for 3 weeks in May. I will be leaving after all the sessions on Monday 2nd May and will be back to coaching on Friday 27th May. It would be really very much appreciated if you could attend the squad sessions in my absence as you have originally planned to do so. We have some great coaches and fantastic sessions lined-up for you, so whilst the weather might be turning a tad cooler, at worst it'll be the equivalent of a nice summer's day in the UK! ;-)
Myself and Adam are heading back to the UK to run two 3-day Swim Smooth Coach Education Courses for 24 coaches from literally all over the world, tutoring them in our stroke correction and training methods. Unfortunately we had to turn down over 30 applicants due to lack of available space on the courses. These two courses will be run at the prestigious Loughborough and Stirling Universities and form part of our grander scheme to develop a fully functional Swim Smooth coaching network around the world. We are being endorsed by both the British Triathlon Federation and Triathlon Scotland for these Clinics and will also run six 1-day swimmer's courses in conjunction with these. Amazingly every Clinic filled up entirely within 90 minutes of announcing them and we have over 100 swimmers on our various waiting lists. All the hard work of the last few years appears to be paying off, however, it does mean that I have to leave you guys here in Perth for this 3 week period in the very capable hands of our local Swim Smooth coaches.
I will be meeting with all the coaches this Saturday to discuss your feedback and requests from your online application forms and to ensure an excellent delivery of the sessions which I have written for delivery in my absence. Any feedback or issues you might like to raise whilst I am away can either be addressed directly with the coach on duty or if you prefer with our newest member of staff, Swim Smooth's Operations Coordinator, France Leaversuch. Francene can be reached on francene@swimsmooth.com and will keep me up to speed with how things are going in Perth whilst I'm over in the UK.
I am very proud to be leaving you with each of these coaches and know that you'll have a great time with them and I'm sure you'll welcome the change to my Pommie accent on pool deck for a short while! Your coaches will be:
- Shelley Taylor-Smith: 7-times world marathon swimming champion and open water endurance specialist. Will get the very best out of you!
- Adam Mullens: super-star surf swimmer, unreasonably handsome and dashing (!) and last week's Albany Harbour Swim overall winner. Will ensure a fun session!
- Sally Scaffidi: top WA triathlete, excellent open water swimmer and uber-motivator on cold mornings. The Biggest Loser fitness trainers have nothing on Sal!
- Nikki Rogers: Sorrento SLSC coach, Commonwealth Games gold medallist swimmer and technique guru. Will fine tune your technique!
- Sandy Burt: top Australian age group Half Ironman specialist, regular Tuesday Swim Smooth coach and bronzed adonis. Takes no prisoners!
- Francene Leaversuch: our newest member of staff, my very own surf skills coach and super-committed. Has a great eye for technique inefficiencies!
For a full breakdown of who will be coaching when, please see:
PAYG Cards:
For ease of management on the pool deck, it'd be preferable if you could order any new PAYG cards online by visiting:
...please print off your receipt and hand it to the coach who will either issue you a card there and then or Francene will have prepared it for you and it'll be awaiting collection in the box. If you get onto this over the weekend in anticipation of any cards expiring, I will of course take care of this all prior to leaving on Monday.
IMPORTANT: there are a couple of you using a joint card with your partner, if you both attend a session, please can you ensure that you notify the coach that the card needs to be ticked twice in this instance. Also, please, please, please try to remember your card each session to be ticked off - forgetting it makes for a bit of an administrative nightmare with several coaches running the sessions.
Future Trips:
For your reference I will also be away this winter for the following two periods:
- 28th July to 12th August (Canada Trip for brother-in-law's wedding)
- 26th August to 16th September (UK Trip for English Channel attempt)
...as such we will be ensuring continued coaching development of all the coaches over the next 6 months in-line with our global coaching development scheme. It's great to have the privilege to work with such great coaches and lovely people as we have here in Perth to initiate this entire process and as ever I welcome any feedback you might have at any time.
Thanks for your time and enjoy the Winter Program!!
Kind regards
Paul
Paul Newsome
Head Coach
World Class Coaching in Your Language!
Tel. +61 (0) 431 540 980
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