Cultivating Talent: 7 Advanced Techniques for Your Child Swimmer’s Growth

The Importance of Advanced Swimming Techniques in Developing Young Talent

Excited to take your child’s swimming skills up a notch? If they’re already making waves in competitive swimming, this post is just what you need! As young swimmers progress, mastering swimming techniques for children can be a game changer in developing their potential. It’s not just about getting faster – it’s about refining their strokes, building endurance, and sharpening their competitive edge. By incorporating swimming drills for kids, increasing intensity, and maintaining consistent training, you’ll see real improvement.

In this guide, we’ll dive deep into swim training tips for your child , helping you understand how to foster rapid development and long-term success in your young swimmer. With the right approach, you’ll be able to nurture their talent and unlock their full potential in the pool! Let’s get started!

Advanced Drills for Developing Young Swimmers’ Strokes

When it comes to developing young swimmers, advanced drills are key to pushing their skills to the next level. A well-rounded training plan includes varying the speed, intensity, duration and distance of each drill to challenge different aspects of a swimmer’s performance. For example, shorter, high-speed sprints build explosive power and quick reflexes, helping swimmers improve their starts and turns. On the other hand, drills focused on longer distances at a steady pace can develop endurance, and lactate threshold, allowing swimmers to maintain better speed throughout a race. 

Intensity also matters – high-intensity sets push swimmers to their limits, increasing their ability to handle fatigue, while lower-intensity sets focus on technique and form. Durations can vary too. Quick, intense bursts work on speed and agility, while longer sets improve stamina and mental toughness. 

Coaches strategically incorporate these variations into training throughout the season. During off-season training, there’s often a focus on more technical, slower paced drills to build aerobic capacity, while in-season training often emphasises speed and race-specific drills. By appropriately adjusting the balance of speed, intensity, duration and distance, young swimmers develop a wide range of skills that prepare them holistically for races.

[X Lab Coaches say…]

Coaches write the squad season plans based on the local swim competition calendar. Check your calendars to see which are the target races for your squad and swimmer! If you are ever curious what your part of the season your swimmer is currently at, ask your coach!

Training consistency for competitive swimming

Consistency is the foundation of success in competitive swimming. Regular practice not only helps young swimmers improve but also ensures that the skills are retained over time. The more consistently a swimmer trains, the more natural their movements become, allowing them to focus on refining technique and gain speed. It’s not just about showing up – it’s about building momentum through repetition. This is the magic of muscle memory! The importance of regular practice for young swimmers becomes even more apparent during the swimming season when skills need to stay sharp for upcoming races. 

Coaches often emphasise maintaining consistent training schedules to create a strong base. This consistency allows swimmers to build on their progress week after week, with minimal detraining. This progression typically ends with a target meet, therefore missing out on any week of training can be detrimental to training progress. Wondering how to build consistency in swim training for kids? It comes down to setting a regular routine and making each practice session count. With steady effort, young swimmers can achieve long-term growth and retain the skills they’ve worked hard to develop. 

Personalised coaching plans for young swimmers

When it comes to unlocking a young swimmer’s full potential, personalised coaching plans are invaluable. Every swimmer has their own unique set of strengths and weakness, and a one-size fits all approach often does not cut it. Tailoring a coaching plan to address these individual needs allows for accelerated improvement and more effective skill development. Whether your child excels in some strokes and struggles with another, customised swim training ensures that every aspect of their performance is fine-tuned. 

The benefits of customised swim training for children are clear: targeting specific areas for improvement but also keeps swimmers engaged and motivated. With a plan designed specifically to suit their squad level, young swimmers receive the precise guidance they need to progress faster and more efficiently. Coaches may tweak the squad’s program slightly for different individuals to maximise the training session for certain individuals or set a slower interval to ensure that the set is manageable for weaker swimmers while still ensuring inclusivity. 

[X Lab Coaches Say…]

It may not always seem like it, but us coaches always take note of all individual swimmers while coaching. In an appropriately sized squad, we can take notice of the strengths and weaknesses of all swimmers.  Even if your swimmer is set to go on a slower interval, it’s not because we want to make it easy for them. Some drills are simply more productive when done slower and more consciously than others. While other intervals may be set to be harder to make. 

Setting SMART Goals for Young Swimmers

Goal setting is a powerful tool in helping young swimmers stay focused and motivated. Without clear goals, it’s easy to lose track of progress or become overwhelmed. Setting goals can help to give your swimmer a sense of direction and purpose, which is essential for improving in competitive swimming. This is where SMART goals come in: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-bound. They create clear and realistic objectives for individuals. For example, instead of a vague goal like “swim faster” a SMART goal would be “improve my 100m freestyle time by two seconds within the next 3 months”. 

Encouraging young swimmers to be aware of their own goals, including personal bests and specific technique or race improvements, fosters a sense of responsibility and ownership over their training. When swimmers can see the progress they’re making towards their goals, it not only builds confidence but also pushes them to work harder. 

Incorporating SMART goals into training plans helps accelerate swim performance by breaking down any long-term goals into manageable steps. Swimmers can track their progress, celebrate small wins and stay motivated as they work towards their next milestone in the pool. 

Using Video Analysis to Enhance Young Swimmers’ Techniques

Video Analysis is a game-changer when it comes to fine-tuning a young swimmers’ technique. While verbal feedback is helpful, sometimes swimmers need to see what they’re doing in the water to fully understand how to improve. The benefits of video feedback for swimmers are huge – it allows them to visually break down their strokes, turns, and starts in slow motion, pinpointing exactly where adjustments are needed. Whether it’s fixing a breathing pattern or smoothing out a dive, video feedback gives swimmers a clear picture of what’s working and what isn’t. 

In many cases, video analysis improves swimming techniques in children far more effectively than verbal feedback alone. Watching themselves swim from a different angle helps them process feedback in a way that’s easy to understand and it offers coaches the opportunity to explain technique corrections with precision. Swimmers can immediately see the difference between how they think they’re performing and what’s actually happening in the water, speeding up the learning process and leading to quicker improvements. 

[X Lab coaches say…]

Typically we would use video analysis and feedback for older swimmers (advanced 11 years olds and above), who have a better understanding of how a ‘perfect’ swim stroke needs to look like. Younger and beginner competitive swimmers may not benefit as much from video feedback as they are still learning the fundamentals of the stroke and not yet in the fine-tuning stage of their learning process. 

Bringing it all Together: The Path to Success for Young Swimmers

As we’ve explored, the combination of advanced drills, consistent training, personalised coaching, SMART goals, and video analysis can unlock tremendous growth in young swimmers. Each element plays a key role in building a well-rounded swimmer ready to compete at higher levels. However, it’s important to remember that every swimmer is unique, and improvement doesn’t always happen linearly. Progress may come quickly for some and more slowly for others, and that’s completely normal. The key is to stay committed and keep moving forward. 

For those looking to take the next step, X Lab’s competitive squad suitable for kids from beginner introductory to advanced youth swimmers is the perfect opportunity to dive deeper into these advanced swim techniques.

Click here to book a class and help your swimmer reach their full potential in the pool!