The glossary
The words we use.
Swimmers here pick up the technical vocabulary in their first weeks, because you can't fix what you can't name. Here's the whole dictionary, in plain language.
The stroke
The first part of the pull, where your hand and forearm take hold of the water. Most of the speed you're missing is hiding here.
The underwater part of the stroke, the part that actually moves you. We film it more than anything else.
The arm travelling forward above the water. Done well, it costs you almost nothing.
Arms locked behind the head, body in one tight line off every wall. The fastest you will ever move in water is in this shape.
How straight your body stays while you swim. Every bend you carry is drag you pay for.
The dolphin kicks off a start or turn, before the first stroke. Races are won and lost down there.
The moment you surface from the underwater phase into your first stroke. Done right, you carry wall speed into the swim.
The numbers
Your time for one section of a race, like each 50 of a 200. Splits tell us how the race actually went, not just how it ended.
Swimming the second half faster than the first. Harder than it sounds, and usually the plan.
How many strokes you take per minute. Faster is not automatically better; it has to match your stroke length.
Strokes per length. Fewer strokes at the same speed means you got more out of each one.
Distance per stroke. The efficiency number: how far one stroke carries you.
The speed you can repeat, not the speed you can hit once. Most of our sets are built around it.
How hard a swim felt, from one to ten. We log it so easy days actually stay easy.
Personal best. The only opponent that really matters here.
Race day
One race within an event. Big events run many heats, and your time ranks you across all of them.
The time you enter a meet with. It decides your heat and your lane.
The exact speed your goal time requires. We train at it so the race is not a surprise.
The rest period before a big meet, when training drops and the speed shows up. The hardest part is trusting it.
The part of the session the day is built around. The coach tells you what it is for before you swim it.
Long course (50m pool) and short course (25m). Times differ between the two, which is why records are kept separately.
Now hear them on deck.
The vocabulary makes more sense in the water. Your first session is free.