The Bolles Swim Team has won 45 state championships and counting in their highly successful history as a nationally known team. Everyone knows the Bolles Swim Team for its victories at a variety of high-level meets, but not many know about all the planning that goes into winning these events and all the hard work put in by not only the swimmers, but also the coaches.
“At this point in the season, we shift our focus in training. We go into a train-to-train phase,” said varsity head coach Jake Gibbons. This phase includes a lot of aerobic training while highlighting the implementation of technique in detail.
Head Coach Peter Verhoef describes the “train-to-train” phase as, “working backwards, every week from the beginning of the season has been working towards this point.” The main focus right now is “doing things well, doing things fast, and recovering as best we can for them going into these championship meets,” said Verhoef.
As far as the swimmers’ practice performances go, Gibbons said he’s “paying more attention to sharp details, think starts, turns, and underwaters” in practice performances as the championship season approaches. These are technical details that can make or break a race.
What everyone wants to know about the coaches’ plan for the swimmers at this time in the season is if they will be tapering. “Tapering is simply the process of adapting your body to the stress you put it under in training,” said Verhoef. Gibbons also believes “in the physical benefits of taper or rest, going into the championship meet.” Verhoef said that the process of tapering includes “taking off morning practices for swimmers to get more sleep and shortening practices while making sure the intensity and focus on detail stays up.”
Practices leading up to the state meet may include changes such as “a little less yardage,” but will be more intense so swimmers may adapt to the championship season. As this goes on and the intensity of practices rises, Gibbons said the coaches are watching for swimmers to “maintain a mental focus, and to maintain the attention to key details of their swimming.”
Gibbons is in charge of creating the state team roster, which he explains to be “the most difficult part of my job.” The data used to create this roster starts with “swimmers’ all-time bests, as well as season performances and progressions,” said Gibbons. While Gibbons is the staff member responsible for the creation of the team roster, the whole coaching staff has a say.
Some of the questions considered when adding swimmers to the state team are, “Have you gotten faster through the high school season? Have you stayed rather stagnant? Or maybe you’ve gotten a little bit slower, what factors may be contributing to that?” said Gibbons.
The mental preparation going to the meet, Verhoef believes, is the most important aspect of attention. “All other decisions and distractions should be moved to the back of your brain so you can focus on doing your job at the meet, which is executing your races the best you can.”. He claims that the best kind of mentality going into on race day is, “being able to walk in the door, knowing what you’re going to do and how you’re going to do it, before you walk in, and execute so you can just show up and do your best.”
The team, as well as the coaches, are always ready both mentally and physically for the state meet and the challenges this highly competitive environment may bring with it.
