Swimmer Stories | Mediterra Swim & Run

Machine Versus Fish

by Coach Mat | 4 Feb, 2012

Next time you’re at the pool or waterway, take a look at the swimmers around you. It is not hard to see the difference between those who swim like ‘machines’ and those that swim like ‘fish’- those that are mechanical in their movements,...

Who is a REAL open-water swimmer?

by Coach Mat | 11 Sep, 2011

Last week I met up with a couple from Lebanon. They heard about me in Antalya and invited me down to Kaş to give them an introductory TI lesson in the sea on their last day of vacation. I asked the gal if she liked to swim out in open-water. She started to explain how...

Don’t Forget To Play

by Coach Mat | 29 Aug, 2011

Have any of us gotten so serious in our swim training that we have forgotten to play? Good swimming involves having a relationship with water. To swim well and swim long a swimmer needs to know the water intimately, to know its ways and how it likes to move and carry...

Courage Is A Skill

by Coach Mat | 3 Jul, 2011

Courage is not possible in the absence of fear, rather courage is the ability to take positive action in the midst of fear. Behind the courage we admire is a trained skill: the ability to focus the mind and effort on something more important, something positive,...

Swim Like You Kayak

by Coach Mat | 13 May, 2011

By invitation, I spent 2 hours in the pool last night observing my Turkish swim coach friends 15 swimmers, all around 9-12 yrs old. While all were working just as hard, stroking away madly, the most remarkable difference between the best swimmers in the lane and the...

Coaching in Portland Oregon USA

by Coach Mat | 13 Mar, 2011

I am back in the Pacific Northwest USA for 3 weeks. I have been joined by TI coaches Shane Eversfield and Ryan Chapman to lead TI 1.0 and 2.0 workshops this weekend at Allstar Fitness in Portland, Oregon. We had two students today, and with such a small group we could...