Let's get this right

For those of you that don't know how I work, which should not be many of you by now, I don't believe you should do something just to do it and if you're going to do it you better do it to the best of your ability. I gave them the warm-up to do. Now the purpose of the warm-up is to get the muscles warm and ready to swim fast. This part of practice is as important as any other part of the practice, however, this is always the part of practice that is done the worst. Because last nights was so bad I had them do it again. Even the second time around they were still stopping to fix goggles and stretch. As a result, I had them do it a third time, but before I had them all get out and explained to them the reason for the warm-up. I explained to them that their parents drop them off a little early for practice to give them time to get ready for practice, which includes: suit, goggles, cap, adjust goggles in the water (I did explain we have 3 other pools they can use to make sure their goggles are adjusted correctly), and stretch. We used yesterday's practice as a learning experience for the kids. I hope the message hit home. I tell the kids, we are not only training them to be swimmers we are also preparing them to be positive contributors to society. We are teaching them life lessons, ie: Don't do a job 1/2 right do it 100% correct, to the best of your ability.