Burlington Aquatic Devilrays

By: Coach Sergei Soloukhin - May. 11, 2009

Australian Youth Tour Report

Devilray swimmer Lindsay Delmar attended the Australian Youth Tour representing Canada at the 2009 Australian Age Nationals in Sydney. Consequently, I was chosen as the Women’s Team coach going to Australia.

This tour was part of an extensive 2008 – 2012 National Junior Team plan and the actual purpose of the trip was a combination of Racing and Training in Sydney and Brisbane.

The goal of this tour was to help our junior swimmers and their coaches develop the will, the attitude and the skills to race to the podium at the Senior International level.

After a long flight to Sydney our team of 13 swimmers and 4 staff members ended up in Mantra Parramatta hotel, not far away from the Olympic Park and Telstra Stadium (2000 Olympic Games Sport Complex).
After couple hours of rest we had a light afternoon training session (5000m). The next day consisted of two training sessions (morning 5000m / afternoon 4500m) before the first day of the meet on Monday.
The Australian Age Nationals was a six days meet with prelims in the morning and finals at night. Our swimmers swam long warm ups 2500-3000m plus their events and then cool down in total of 5000-5500m for each session (prelims and finals). Each day our group covered not less than 10000 m.
Those swimmers who didn’t make finals had to complete practice during general warm up approximately 5500m in total. At the end of the meet our group covered around 75 km in 7 days.
It was interesting to know that all swimmers performed well during their races despite the volume of swimming they covered during this meet (2-3% from PB times). Some of them, including Lindsay, swam best times (4 out of 7 events with PB for Lindsay was a remarkable performance).
The meet itself was fantastic, professionally run by the organizers and officials. All swimmers and coaches were allocated to specific areas, so the deck of the pool was absolutely clear, which is unusual for Canadian meets. The Marshall escorted the swimmers to their assigned lanes for each heat in prelims and finals. After each race swimmers had to swim to the sides of the pool in order to get out, climbing up on the deck in front of the timers was not allowed (part of FINA regulation).
Preliminary sessions were relatively normal in time length but the finals were extremely long. The medal presentation was done by former Olympians in most cases or by the National level VIPs’. The finals ran as late as 10 o’clock in the evening.
It was a tremendously demanding schedule in Sydney, but all swimmers were able to pick a notch and did a great job during the Australia Age Nationals meet.
After the end of the meet, our Team traveled by air to Brisbane and then by bus to Miami on the Gold Coast. I was pleasantly surprised when the bus driver asked me (after noticing that we were swimmers), “Are you guys going to swim with Dennis and Grant”? Swimming in Australia is very much like hockey in Canada, locals know all their successful swimming coaches and athletes…., kind of cool…

By the way, Pro-Ma Miami Dolphins won 2009 Australia Age Championship in final points. So here we go to the top Team in Australia for training……
Our Team lodged in Sailfish Cove Resort, walking distance from Miami Swim Club and the most beautiful beach of South Pacific Ocean. Swimmers and coaching staff had half a day off, it was well received after the extensive and demanding meet schedule.
Our next step was to complete seven training sessions with Dennis Cotterell the head coach of the Miami Swim Club. Dennis has been the Head Coach for the club since 1976 and is one of the most successful Coaches in Australia, producing many world class swimmers over his successful swimming career.
Dennis is best known for his swimmer Grant Hackett, former 400m and current world record holder for 1500m freestyle. What can I say; Grant was remarkable swimmer with remarkable performances in long distance swimming….

Literally Dennis and Grant turned the swimming world upside-down in one night with the new approach on how to swim a mile….. Grant made long distance event (1500m) looked like mid distance and mid distance event (400m) like sprint event, that how fast he was….
Miami Swim Club has two 50m outdoor swim pools and a 20m teaching pool for the beginners and Dennis is very much in control of the facility and his team. We swam in both pools (one in the morning and the other in the afternoon). Our morning sessions were from 5:30 am to 7:45 am and afternoon from 4:30 pm to 6:45 pm.
The training sessions were long (7000m-7500m) and extremely demanding in the pace of swimming. Dennis’s squad consisted from several foreign swimmers, clubs swimmers (represented Australian National Team), triathletes (current world champions) and other fast swimmers from around the world.
The rules during the training sessions are very simple. After Dennis’s explanation of the practice all swimmers were going to pace lanes for each set, right to left – fastest to slowest pace for the same workout, and if someone doesn’t make the pace he /she simply asked to move to the left…. I recall one practice when most of our swimmers ended up swimming in the slowest pace lane; it was a little bit shocking for our coaching staff, considering that we brought to Australia one of the best 16 and under Canadian swimmers. I believe it was the fourth afternoon session, our kids were able to regroup and demonstrated a better job on the following practices.
The environment during Dennis’s practices was positive and somewhat relaxing despite of the high demands of the training sets in the water. It was nice to see how our swimmers were able to adapt to these physically and mentally challenging practices by the end of the 7th training session.
I’m sure that for most of our young Canadian athletes it was an eye opening experience on how to train and also what your body and spirit are capable of….
After all, this trip was extremely educational not only for Lindsay but for me as well. What can I say; Aussie really can train during their swim sessions….
At the end I want to say thanks to the BAD coaching staff who covered my absence and the Executive Board members who approved my trip to Australia with Canadian Swimming team.

Sergei