No Progress | Mediterra Swim & Run

Moving From Novice To Expert – Part 1

by Coach Mat | 29 Dec, 2018

It should be well understood that there is a process, and usually a long process we must follow in moving from a novice to an expert in the fundamental skills for an art or sport. There is a process or a path to follow, but there is not a single ‘recipe’...

Moving From Novice To Expert – Part 2

by Coach Mat | 29 Dec, 2018

Continued from Part 1… Stages Of Attention Control Not only is your neuromuscular (motor) control being trained, so is your attention, because the two are working together intimately in the development process. At first the attention is directed onto the part of...

Can You Increase Speed Without Increasing Power?

by Coach Mat | 22 Dec, 2018

Can you increase speed without increasing power? Yes, and no. Or rather, it depends. To explain why the answer could be yes and it could be no, let’s look at the speed equation: Stroke Length x Stroke Rate = Speed (Velocity) In terms of training in the pool,...

What You Can Learn About Speed From Butterfly

by Coach Mat | 2 Sep, 2018

Even if you do not practice the butterfly stroke, you may appreciate this approach to solving the not-getting-any-faster problem… Coach Jamee and I have been working with a mother and three kids (10, 12 and 16) on a swim team who came to us to work on freestyle...

Designing A Weekly Practice Pattern

by Coach Mat | 28 Jul, 2018

This is part of a series called The Happier Swimmer: how to set up your practice lifestyle so that you are making steady improvement toward your goal, making the body safer and stronger, and enjoying the process more than ever so you have the motivation to keep...

Don’t Work Against Your Own Motion

by Coach Mat | 21 Jul, 2018

I have been looking back at my notes from studying one of the books from The Pose Method of Running, by Nicholas Romanov, and ran across this quote on relaxation that had caught my attention previously. It adds another dimension to my thoughts shared in a previous...