College Swimming: What To Expect Freshman Year

This article talks about what to expect during freshman year of NCAA college swimming. More specifically, it talks about transition from club swimming including weight training, goal setting, and trust the process.

Sep 2, 2017 by Connor McCourt

College Swimming: What To Expect Freshman Year

Transitioning from high school to college is one of the most fascinating times in your life. You're thrown onto a campus with thousands of others your age and expected to learn to live on your own immediately. For some, this transition is seamless. But for others, it takes a little while to fully adjust. Incoming freshman swimmers also face the burden of transitioning from their club training to the college stage, which is much easier said than done. Not to mention the international swimmers who have to transition from meters to yards.

A New Lifestyle

A typical club swimmer goes through a highly structured week consisting of morning practices, school, afternoon practices, dinner, and homework -- with not much spare time except for Saturday afternoons and Sundays. College provides much more free time and activities to participate in. You'll be on a new diet, sleeping different hours, and living almost completely on your own.

There will also be plenty of distractions that you can easily find yourself getting caught up in. If mismanaged, this new lifestyle can be detrimental to training and overall performance. No matter how independent you think you may be, the adjustment to college life will take some time. That's why every year some of the most prized recruits struggle to repeat their high school performances. This usually is attributed to the new lifestyle they've taken up.

You should come into your freshman year excited and eager to learn. Your coaching staff and teammates will give you all the resources necessary to succeed. Whether or not you are on scholarship or on the travel squad, you're still as equally important to the team as anyone else. The attitude you bring to practice will directly affect those training around you -- make your training group an enjoyable for your teammates and the results in practice will speak for themselves.

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Weights? Who Needs 'Em? (You Do)

An overlooked aspect of starting college swimming is weight training. The typical incoming freshman may have minimal experience in the weight room, but usually nothing compared to the full programs offered in college. Weight training has a steep learning curve, and any sort of improper technique or half-effort could easily result in a season-ending injury. Even if you think you've lifted before, slow your roll because taking precious time to learn proper technique up front will prevent you from having to re-learn a movement later on -- or even worse, time spent rehabbing an injury. There's absolutely no reason to be the freshman who jumps on the bench and tries to max out on the first set, making a complete and utter fool of yourself.

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Know Your Goals. Set Your Goals. Achieve Your Goals

Every swimmer has goals when they begin their freshman year. It may be as big as qualifying for NCAA's, making the conference team, or possibly just going a best time. But because of the new lifestyle discussed above, these goals might not be as easy to attain as they seemed during the summer. With that being said, setting goals is absolutely imperative to success, but you have to keep them attainable as you chip away. If you walk out of freshman year without a best time or fall short of your goals, take a deep breath and move on. The successful moments will eventually materialize so long as you are doing the right things in and out of the pool.

They may not arrive your first year, but they will eventually come around. As Joel Embiid -- NBA player for the Philadelphia 76ers -- famously says: TRUST THE PROCESS. Trust the training plan that your coaches have worked so diligently to put together for you, even if you completely disagree with it. The worst thing you can do is doubt your training plan. Doubt breeds fear and fear produces negative results. Have you ever watched someone with an over-emotional post-race celebration and wished that could be you one day? Good news. It can.

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Stay The Course

It's important to remember that your fellow incoming freshmen will come from a variety of different training philosophies and clubs all over the country -- even the world. None of you will experience the exact same results at the end of the season. Some freshman will blow things out of the water and make significant time drops. Others may struggle and not drop time in a single event. Regardless of where you fall on this spectrum, remember that your college career is not dependent on what you do as a freshman. Countless swimmers need a year or two to progress before they breakout at some point in their final years.

To all incoming freshmen this fall: congratulations. You're about to enter the most challenging, yet rewarding, experience of your life thus far. Set goals and stay the course -- eventually you will knock those goals into oblivion and be ready for the next challenge.

Oh yeah -- don't forget to have a little fun, too. It is college after all.

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