When I started the first version of our online training in 2012, my intention was to provide support for our camp and workshop swimmers, who traveled from afar, who were going home and had no local coach and no materials to show them what to do in the weeks and months to come.
Have you ever felt that vacuum?
The Purpose Of Our Online Training Site
At these early live events I tried to load our students with information and answer every question while we were together, but it was too much and not enough! (Maybe some of you remember that?) I desperately wanted to help them keep going and thrive in their training back home. So, I started dumping that information onto the website with access limited to alumni.
The dedicated website – now called the Meditera Swim Dojo – is in its third or fourth iteration, and has grown into the largest repository of mindful, technique-oriented training plans and training knowledge that I know of, online or in print. We have 100s of knowledge base and FAQ articles, practice instructions, exclusive blog posts, practice examples, video tutorials, and now there are even weekly training podcasts.
We use this site to support our students in practice between and after their live training experiences. It is not considered an adequate replacement for that initial live training with a certified coach, if one has the chance to do that, because so much is transmitted to you through the touch, the explanations, the demonstrations and the interactive feedback you receive with a live coach (who knows how to do all that well). But our online training can take you really far from that point onward.
Our training plans are unlike anything else we’ve seen offered online or in print because:
- they combine your technique and fitness development together in the main sets
- the practice patterns each week, and from week to week balance the principle of repetition and the principle of variation to integrate your skills more quickly
- the practices, from week to week, are calculated to increase the challenge on your skills in small increments, in carefully chosen ways
In other words, there is a principle-based, carefully calculated flow to each practice plan, from start to finish.
I felt very supported by you, Mat, by the thoughtfulness of your lesson plans and how they do add up to acquiring skills. (J.H. from USA)
Personalized Training
I admit that our training plans are not for the person who just wants to be told what do to and not have to concentrate much in practice. We offer something quite different from the typical. There are so many different kinds of people out there – you know you are one – and though all standard-equipped humans need to abide by the same universal principles for development, our plans take into account the decisions you need to make in order to personalize the activities and challenge level to fit your current skills and conditions. When you start your first course this takes some study time to understand the principles and to initially learn how to make those decisions in our training plan. Our courses and the library behind it are set up to teach you how to do this. But once you get the hang of it, you can make those decisions easily and feel confident about it.
So, we offer two versions of each training plan: 1) self-coached, for those who feel ready to guide themselves in these decisions, and 2) coach-guided, for those who would like me to give feedback on their practice results and assist them in making decisions from practice to practice.
All of this for the overall aim of teaching you to eventually be able to coach yourself – to write a series of practices, to take in feedback and to adjust your next steps based on that feedback. A skilled, live coach is going to always be able to help you go farther – consider that every Olympic athlete has a coach! – but you can be empowered with understanding to take yourself so much farther than you imagined, and not feel dependent on someone to tell you what you need to do next.
Very happy with my progress! Thank you, Mat. The structure of your programme and the way in which you coach has been a tremendous help so far! (M.M. from South Africa)
Training Plan Memberships
These are the training plan memberships we have in the Dojo:
For a General Skills, 6-month, 3-level training plan
Level 1
- Freestyle Fundamentals
- Stroke & Pace Mastery Stage 1 & 2
- Master Class Breathing
- Master Class 1K
- Master Class Synchronization
Level 2
- Stroke & Pace Mastery Stage 3 & 4
- Stroke & Pace Mastery Stage 5 & 6
- Training Plan 100 Sprint
- Training Plan 2K (perfect for Olympic and half-Ironman)
- Training Plan 5K (perfect for full Ironman)
- Training Plan 10K (about a week away from being published)
- Training Plan 20K
And, I have designed the Self-Coaching 101 course to walk you through the principles and steps of how to create your own training plan. If you feel you would like to move beyond the plans that other coaches (including me) provide for you, this course will show you how to do it.
Mat, thanks! I never expected an online course to be so helpful and motivating. (N.G. from Switzerland)
Train With Us To Learn To Train Yourself
Yes, I would like you to consider what we have to offer on the Mediterra Swim Dojo, if you happen to be in need of some structure and guidance for your training goals. Or perhaps you don’t know what to do and just need an achievement goal merely as a tool to get you working deliberately on your skills.
But I also want you to be aware that skill training does go way beyond just learning to form a nice stroke for a few laps in the pool. If you want that beautiful, easy swimming to last for hours in all sorts of conditions, you need to train those skills to hold up for hours, under all sorts of conditions. Just know that there are principles involved and attention required in order to swim skillfully at a higher level, and there is at least one, amply-stocked online program out there providing that for technique-oriented swimmers like you.
But we are not stopping at giving you training plans – we want you to learn how to make them for yourself!
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