Season Planning, Writing and Running Age Group Workouts

Guy Edson is an ASCA Level 5 Age Group Coach and a long time clinic speaker on all things related to age group coaching. In this clinic presentation, he arms you with the tools you need to create the most productive age group specific workouts possible.

Edson believes that to create a well thought out, goal based plan you need to develop workouts by objective rather than by yardage, while at the same time integrating your personal training philosophy to create a system that works for you.

This DVD provides tools to create workouts that produce greater results and an environment that is more fun for coaches and swimmers. This, in turn, leads to greater job stability and greater support of your age group program.

Edson's workout design process is targeted to swimmers ages 9-12, but the system also works well for younger developmental swimmers and developmental high school groups. Edson's goal-based plan is centered on meeting the physiological, psychological and developmental needs of the age group swimmer.

Edson presents nine basic components of an age group workout that include aerobic base conditioning, awesome kicking, learning how to race, long quality swims and sprinting. These components meet the technical aspects of skill development, while mixing in competitiveness and fun. Each component is explored in detail with examples. He also looks to cycle "points of focus" into workouts based upon specific periods of the season. This leads into a segment that assists a coach in creating a seasonal plan based upon objectives. In turn, the seasonal plan becomes a road map for workout construction.

Edson details 20 ideas for writing and running a great practice. These ideas come from years of hands on age group coaching experience and serve as an invaluable guide to creating, executing and coaching a great workout. These ideas include a discussion of how to group swimmers, working with a wide range of abilities, how to be creative, how to incorporate your assistant coaches, and how to end practices with something exciting. Edson includes a segment on how to write various types of sets including straight stroke sets and complex sets that offer greater variety and more relevance to racing or stroke development.

Included throughout this presentation are invaluable tools to engage your swimmers and create high productivity and more enjoyment both for the coach running the workout and for the swimmers.

This program is an essential tool for all coaches wanting to improve the efficiency of their workouts.

59 minutes. 2011.