I know I took a couple of days break from writing, but this had a lot to do with things going on that had my mind twisting and I tried to write but everything I put down was just not right or seemed forced so I just stopped and gave myself some time to think.

I get to write today about Zoey and her swimming. I just learned today that the first meet of the season is April 5th. So that’s the next milestone she gets to work towards. We are not looking at qualification times yet or even what old times she has yet. Actually, our goal for this first meet is to pick a few events and see where she is and work from there.

It’s funny the pool is still set up for a short course because this last weekend was the State finals for Short Course. So it’s hard to get excited for the long course season when the kids are still working a 25-meter course at practice. The change over of the pool won’t happen until the spring break that is in a couple of weeks. Once this happens, you will now enter a 50-meter pool. It’s a little harder on the team because the lanes get condensed down from 16 lanes to 8 lanes. This means more kids in each lane.

I was talking to the senior group today at the pool. They were all sad that the short course is over because for some odd reason, this set of kids love the underwater portion of turns and use it to their speed advantage. Where Zoey actually likes the swim portion of the 50 meter better because she isn’t as fast at turns as those kids. In the future, I’m sure that will change with Zoey, but for now, she gets to focus on better technique while swimming, and the turns become less important, like in short course.

This long course season, we will focus on the 100m Freestyle and Backstroke. We will also try another 500m event, and if I get my way, a medley is in the works for this season. A medley is a 4 stroke event. 200m IM is the normal in the long course season. The swimmer jumps in and does a butterfly for 50 meters, then turns and does a backstroke for 50 meters, turns and does breaststroke, and the last 50 meters is a freestyle race. It is my favorite event, and Zoey has been training to do it, and this season, we will get her in to do at least one, if not a few.

The good news is that since we stopped focusing on short courses, Zoey has done an amazing job of working on ab workouts. We had read that abs was the next thing she needed to start working on besides technique to get faster, so we started incorporating abs into her daily routine along with we have been much better at what she has been eating and making sure she has proper nutrition.

I will tell you one thing it’s snowy and cold here, and most sports are shut down right now. I know my soccer team has barely practiced due to weather, but the pool has been open, and the team has been practicing. This is awesome to see, and I am glad we found the right place for Zoey to train. All the uncertainty early this year has all faded away as new people have taken over, and the team looks better each day.