HYDRA Aquatics

This newsletter is our best method of getting broad sweeps of information out to our members. We know some people like WhatsApp or email and we will deliver this letter through those formats but also post this on our website. It is our plan to have this out in the last week of each month.

We have a WhatsApp group for the Senior and Junior groups. Please make sure Coach Jeff has your phone number. It is a broadcast group so that means two things - you must put Jeff's phone number in your contacts to receive the messages (3380 4332) and if you reply to any message it only comes to Jeff and not to all the people on the list. We can add any swimmers to the list if we have parent's permission so forward those numbers to Jeff if you would like them included.

Alright - here we go!

We have more than 90 swimmers registered in our various competitive level programs and 160 in our FUNdamentals program. It is an exciting time!

Our schedule, in the first 10 weeks, is impacted by the ASD high school swim team using the indoor pool from 3:30 - 5:20(ish) four nights a week. This puts the HYDRA swimmers in a position where we are swimming late a few nights a week. We hope you can work with us and recognize that this is a short term challenge and we will adjust as soon as we can.

Here are the schedules for all our non-FUNdamentals programming:

Masters (this is for adults) - Sunday and Wednesday evening from 6:45 - 8:00 p.m. at the outdoor pool. Any parents that may be interested in getting in the water Coaches Marouane and Jawad would be happy to have you join the group.

Pre-Competitive - two groups - Saturday (10:00 - 11:00 a.m.), Monday and Wednesday (5:45 - 6:45 p.m.). This group is completely full with 30 swimmers. Coaches Marouane, Jawad and Mourad will be working with these swimmers. The second group is Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday from 5:45 - 6:45 p.m. with Coaches Marouane, Jawad and Oumaima. This class is almost full right now.

Junior Competitive Blue - our newest group - we have brought in Coach Nat who has been in the Doha swim and triathlon community for years to work with this group. Coach Oumaima will be assisting Nat.

Our Junior program has grown to the point where we have the opportunity to split the group. This is going to provide a lower coach to swimmer ratio and a better environment for the swimmers. This is one of the groups who are swimming late and we hope that parents and swimmers will recognize the value of the program for a few weeks and adjust their study schedules accordingly. This is a stepping stone from Pre-Comp to the Junior Gold group and we should see a bunch of Pre-Comp swimmers looking to move into this group as quickly as they can to increase their training and racing opportunities.

Junior Competitive Blue practices - Saturday 8:00 - 10:00 a.m. at the indoor pool. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday 6:30 - 8:00 p.m. at the outdoor pool.

Junior Competitive Gold - Coach Alex will be assisted by Coach Youssef to run this group. They will swim Saturday from 8:00 to 10:00 a.m. and Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday from 5:00 - 6:45 p.m. at the indoor pool. Each practice will start with some dryland activities while the ASD high school team finishes their workouts so swimmers are asked to meet at the scoreboard end of the pool. Junior Competitive Gold swimmers are invited to come on Thursday morning for a one hour session any time between 5:30 and 7:30 a.m. with an opportunity to train with some of the Senior group.

Senior Competitive - Coach Jeff will be assisted by Coaches Youssef, Roseal and at least one other to be decided. We have done what we can to mitigate the late sessions. We are looking to add a long course practice each week on Fridays but have not finalized that pool time yet. Saturdays have moved to the afternoon. Here is how a week will look and swimmers are asked to attend at least 6 workouts:

Saturday - Gym 3:00 - 4:00 + Swim 4:00 - 6:00 p.m.

Sunday - Swim 5:30 - 7:30 a.m. (swimmers should plan for an hour in the water so they can leave to get to school); 6:30 - 8:30 p.m.

Monday - Swim 6:30 - 8:30 p.m.

Tuesday - Gym 5:30 - 7:30 a.m. (1 hour session); Swim 3:15 - 5:15 p.m.

Wednesday - Swim 6:30 - 8:30 p.m.

Thursday - Swim 5:30 - 7:30 a.m. (no afternoon until at least after ASD high school season)

Friday - to be confirmed once we have secured pool time.

No equipment purchase is necessary for our FUNdamentals or Pre-Competitive swim groups. These groups will use a kickboard and sometimes a pull buoy or fins. These are available from the ASD equipment room. Starting in the Junior Blue group swimmers should be acquiring their own equipment

Junior Blue - kickboard, pull buoy, fins

Junior Gold - kickboard, pull buoy, fins, paddles

Senior - kickboard, pull buoy fins, paddles, TritonWear (supplied by HYDRA)

These items may be stored at the pool in the swimmer’s equipment bags. Some of this equipment is available at local sports stores but here are links to the recommended items from online retailers. Both these retailers have sales and promo codes frequently available. These are also good locations for racing suits at reasonable prices with short delivery times.

US - Swim Outlet - https://www.swimoutlet.com/

UK - Pro Swimwear - https://www.proswimwear.co.uk/

September 30 Qatar Foundation Meet #1 Details will be distributed soon

October 7/8 HYDRA Short Course Showdown Tentative

October 28/29 Autumn Cup Hamad (hopefully?) - main events

November 10/13 MESAC Champs ASD high school team members

January 13 QF Meet #2 everyone races 200 Free + choice

February 10 QF Meet #3 everyone races 100 Free, 100 choice

February 17/18 HYDRA Invitational Heats/Finals of 50/100m events

March 11/12 Speedo Swim Invite Dubai - qualifiers (travel on Thursday)

March 17/18 Spring Cup

Mar 31, Apr 6/13 Ramadan Racing Thursday night at the races - 3 meet series for HYDRA and invites

May 19 QF Meet #4

May 27/28 Last Chance Meet Dubai - qualifiers (travel on Thursday)

June 9 QF Meet #5

There will be additions or changes as the year progresses.

We are going to start hosting swim meets. To run these meets we will need volunteers on deck. We are going to distribute a large PowerPoint presentation of the requirements to be a Stroke and Turn official for swimming. We will host a clinic for any parents interested in becoming an official on Tuesday, September 13 at 5:00 p.m. that will last for approximately 1 hour.

All clubs require a large number of volunteers to host successful events and we look forward to many of you helping out with out meets. We will continue to run training sessions through the year to grow the skills of our volunteers. Thank you for your help.

We have created a team handbook that addresses the majority of questions we receive regularly from our membership. This will be distributed as a PDF in the next week and will be available on our website. Please review the handbook and let us know if you have any questions.

Each newsletter we will address an issue common to all swimmers. At the start of this season let's take a deep dive into Goal Setting.

Ah yes, the Big Goal. You know—that pesky personal best time, making the national team, winning an Olympic gold medal. The Big Goal continually runs in the back of your mind like an app on your smartphone. And like the pages of code required to keep an app functioning properly, we imagine the Big Goal requires a long, complex routine.

After all, because it’s big achieving it requires a super, mega complicated plan. But this is typically not the best way for chasing awesomeness in the water.

Here’s why simple is better when it comes to your Big Goal.

Why We Love Big, Super Complicated Goals

Every time we set out a new goal (or pulling an old goal out of the dustbin), it’s the same story. The first instinct is for our brains to figure out the thousand things we need to do in order to achieve it.

As an age group swimmer, it would look like this:

Wake up extra early before morning practice and foam roll Stay after practice for an additional 15 minutes to work on core strength. Do 5 kicks off every wall for every push-off. Write goals for the practice before getting in the water. Do an extra 15 dives after practice. Drink a protein shake after every workout. Spend ten minutes reviewing your practice before bed. Meal prep all your meals. Video review technique every Friday afternoon. And so on.

Impressive, right?

This spectacular routine would last about a day or two before a task would get missed and the routine would fall apart. It would quickly become frustrating and after a week we would give up on our goal. Even though we were not sticking to this big and complex routine, we keep drifting back to this pattern.

Why?

For several reasons:

Complex plans are super exciting.

Writing out a big list of things that will improve my swimming is fun. It's exciting. White-knuckles on the roller-coaster handle type of fun. Even reading that list above may get you pumped up. Writing a simple, short list of things to focus on each day, on the other hand… kind of dull.

It was super challenging.

In order to accomplish big things in the water, we often assume it is necessary to push ourselves to the breaking point each day with our process and routine. Big Goals require Herculean levels of effort and focus, right? The more challenging the routine, the faster we can get to our goals.

Mysterious.

Finally, introducing this level of complexity was also a bit of self-sabotage. We give ourselves a way out in the event of failure by building up our goals and the journey to get there by making it mythical and mysterious. By imagining the solution to be grander and more complex than it is, we had a way out when things didn’t go our way.

But while a big and complex process was exciting (while making it, at least), there were some downsides:

Almost guaranteed to fail.

Complexity has a lot of moving parts. And the more moving parts you have, the more things can go wrong.

Stressful.

You are always “on”, running from task to task. Sustaining this kind of effort and focus is draining and robs you of the time and space to recover and replenish. And because there are so many things to do, so many variables at play, it’s hard for our brain to keep things ordered, making us feel even more stressed out.

Equates the same value to unequal actions.

Complexity usually ends up assigning similar value to things that aren’t similar in value. Stretching for ten minutes after practice is obviously important, but is it as important as giving an excellent effort in the water? Drinking a glass of water when you wake-up is clearly important, but is it as important as making every practice this week? Complexity often muddies the water with all the things we need to do, lending equal weight to tasks and objectives that do not provide equal output.

Shiny New Thing Syndrome.

Complexity is a great way to keep ourselves interested (not necessarily a bad thing, obviously) by introducing new shiny things to focus on that ultimately distract us from the core process of what it takes to be successful in the water. Jumping from new thing to new thing gets old as it reduces the sustained effort we apply to improving.

Focus on the Fundamentals (and the Results Will Take Care of Themselves). So knowing that complex plans aren’t always the best route to take, what do we do to make sure that we stay focused on the things that matter?

Keep a simple process.

One of the first pieces of advice we give to swimmers is to list the 3-5 things they could do every day that would help them get to their goals, that they control, and that can sustain.

Things like: Show up to practice 15 minutes early to stretch and warm-up Eat a healthy dinner Give an effort of 8.5/10 or better at practice Write out my swim practice when I get home

We know these things don’t seem like they would drive otherworldly results in the pool. But it establishes a doable baseline that will infect the rest of your swimming with excellence. It’s a continuous battle to keep complexity from jumping on the page with this exercise, but it’s super worth writing these things down and keeping them visible for days where the shadow of complexity creeps in.

Focus on the fundamentals.

The path to your goals is always going to be simpler than you think. Looking back on the times you achieved success in the water, was it by overcomplicating things? Or was it by focusing on a couple of key aspects of your swimming and doing them really, really well? The fundamentals never go out of style in the water.

Be honest about what works for you.

Having a process or routine that works for you is crucial. It’s tempting to copy what others do, but you know yourself best. Even if your individual routine isn’t the prettiest, if it works for you, use it!

Strike a balance.

Complexity is exciting. There’s no doubt. And as you become more of an expert in the pool, as your speed and skill increase, you will be able to tackle more complicated goals and processes. Finding the balance is crucial. If you find yourself stuck in the mud, not moving forward with your goals, step back and ask if you are overcomplicating things and avoiding the simple stuff.

“Simplicity is a great virtue but it requires hard work to achieve it and education to appreciate it. And to make matters worse: complexity sells better.” — Edsger W. Dijkstra

“The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak.” – Hans Hoffman

https://www.yourswimlog.com/why-you-should-keep-things-simple-with-your-big-goals/

Thanks for reviewing all this material. If you have questions or suggestions for content please send Coach Jeff a note at hydra.headcoach@asd.edu.qa

See you at the pool.

Go HYDRA Go!