What is the life of a young competitive swimmer like?

Question

An eleven-year-old boy is a very talented competitive swimmer. What is likely to happen in his life? Are there swim teams beyond school teams (municipal or provincial teams, for example) that he might be drafted to? At what age is he likely to start training for the Olympics? What would his training regime be like at this age? I'd be interested in any details about what the life of a young competitive swimmer is like.

Answer 1

there are club swim teams but he wont be drafted there. and basically when you start training for swimming you begin your career so, if he takes it super serious he could make it to the olympics. theres girls that make it onto the olympic team at the age of twelve but they probabaly began swimming really early on. swimming is a serious sport. its hard core. you have to take every practice seriously. its not like any other sport out there. he'd have fun. =) there are work outs. usually start with dry land or at some point if its a good team they do dry land and then go in the pool. hope i helped. =)

Answer 2

tiring

Answer 3

Well first off you would swim at a club. If you look on google and write what ever city you live in and write swimming clubs next to it you will find a bunch in your aera. i.e.- Dallas, Texas swimming clubs ( That isnt where I live by the way : ]) You would train by how good you are at my club I practice 7 times a week. But I am in the top group.

        The only way that you would train for the olympics is if you are incredabely fast and made the olympic trials cut. Once you make it to olympic trials then only 2 people in each event out of more than 100 get to go to the olympics. The chances of anybody making it to the olympics is smaller than getting hit by lightning! But if you have the drive to make it there then you could make it! The age that you would train at would be the age that you would make it to the olympics at. People can be1 - 100000 it doesnt matter.

        You would have meets almost every 3 weeks. You would have to train a billion times harder than a school team or summer league team. Before a meet you would have to eat healthy and drink a LOT of water. Be prepared to swim a 50 -1650 at meets.

          Hope I helped!!!!

Answer 4

Well, I am pretty close to that age and heres what my life is like:

I get up at 7:30 every week day to go swim an hour at my summer league swim team.  Then, at 7:00 at night on every weekday I swim 2 hours at my year around swim team, WOW. Except Wednesdays because those are days I have swim meets. I only go to the morning practice on Wednesdays. Then, over the weekends I usually go to my neighborhood pool and do about...ehh 50 laps. Not even close to what I swim at normal practices way less but still it's swimming.  As for training for the olympics your times have to be close to the time cuts for the olympic trials. If they are, then u should probably get ur own personal coach. (I am not quite up to this level yet though) I would love to go to the olympics and even though it's alot of training, your friends are right beside you and it's tons of fun even through grueling practices. My school doesn't have a swim team :( So I just stay with my year around swim team and the summer league one over the summer. HTH!!

Answer 5

it's great that he's good!  but before you set your sights on olympics you should put him on a club team.  when i was his age i practiced like 6 days a week for an hour to 2 hours.

now at 17 i practice tues. thurs. fri. and sat. mornings for 2 hrs.  at night its mon-fri 2 hrs on morning practice days and 2.5 when there is no mornings.  wed is extra long because it's long course  so 5-8pm  sunday is off and i'm glad about it!! lol  we are required to attend like 5-7 practices a week depending on what level you're at but you go to as many as you can.

Answer 6

As I am not an Olympic athlete I don't know what kind of training that would entail exactly. However I do know that training for the Olympics is something that can start very young (around his age now). As for a general picture of what being a young competitive swimmer is like, I can give you that.

It is being constantly tired because you have to wake up early in the morning (often before 5am) to go to a workout for  1-2 hours. Then maybe have a short break for breakfast (a nap if you're very lucky) before going to school.

After trying not to fall asleep in school all day you rush over to the pool for another 2-3 hour long practice. After that is dinner, homework, and bed. Many swimmers also coach or teach lessons so add in about another 1-2 hours of that after the evening practice.

On weekends without a swim meet it means an early morning Saturday practice (typically the hardest of the week) that lasts from 2-4 hours. I was lucky that Saturday mornings were my only weekend practice, but some teams and swimmers training for something like the Olympics have more than one Saturday practice or a Sunday practice too.

Weekends with a swim meet generally involve 1-4 days of getting up before dawn to go to the meet, staying there all morning, resting a few hours at the hotel and then doing it all again in the evening until well after dark. This intensity can change depending on the kind of meet, but for an Olympic hopeful, expect the rigorous schedule.

Also add to this schedule times for lifting weights and other dryland workouts and you can see how quickly life will become all about eating, sleeping, and swimming. Young swimmers who train like this do not have many friends outside of swimming (though some do) and do not have much free time. It takes a great deal of scheduling and commitment both on the part of the parent and the swimmer to make it work.

However, people who train like this often wouldn't want any other life. Sometimes they wish for an entire weekend to themselves, but once they get it they find they're ready to be back in the pool.

Answer 7

well he would join a club and if he was really good, he'd train around 5/6/7 times a week. He would go to county events, and if he got very quick times he could go to nationals. he might only qualify in around 4 events though. he might be spotted for the olympics and nationals.

( i swim at a club myself, which is how i know!)