Weekly Practice Schedule

November 3rd-9th, 2019

All practices will run as scheduled this week. Please CLICK HERE to visit our website, and view the MAC weekly practice schedule.

Look forward to a week of perfecting your open turns! Join Kris on Monday morning for an amazing introductory progression, great for any level of swimmer!

News:

1. MAC Lite PM, will begin this week.  Starting Monday, November 4th, there will be a MAC lite practice, starting at 7:00pm (in addition to Thursday’s 8:00-8:45am practice). For information about MAC lite, CLICK HERE.

2.South Lyon Meet will be Saturday, November 16th.  You can register at MichiganMasters.com

3.  Register/renew your USMS membership NOW for 2020, and get the last two months of 2019 for free! This is a great opportunity for those of you slackers that didn’t sign up and do any meets last year, to get a jump start on some silver medals at the South Lyon meet next weekend! You can register at: USMS.org

4. Next week: (not THIS week) The week of Nov. 11-15th, ALL morning practices will be at Lakeland High School, 1630 Bogie Lake Rd., White Lake, MI 48383. due to morning PE classes at MHS.

Swimmer of the Week:

Ellen Defever

How did I ever get to MAC and Masters swimming?

First of all, I have loved swimming and water for as long as I can remember.  Growing up in the thumb of Michigan there were no swimming pools but we had Lake Huron.  I first heard about Masters swimming when I was 30, about 40 plus years ago, from Jewel Cooke, a community education swim instructor.  I was astounded that anyone that old was swimming competitively.  I guess I thought she was ancient (probably in her late 60’s) and it went on my “bucket list” before there were bucket lists.

In 2013, Sue Haapaniemi  told me about MAC and graciously took me to my first few practices.  I loved it!!   When a coach “yells” at you and corrects your stoke, it’s the best.  It means they think this old person can and will improve.  I thoroughly enjoy “most” practices because swimming is also a thinking activity and boy,  do you do a lot of that in practice.  It’s  fun to meet others who really care  about swimming,  the strokes, etc.  and gosh, along the way you make friends.

I have been married 51 years to John – after one date and a two week engagement (go figure). I am a retired clinical trials nurse.  I enjoy gardening, bicycling, canning, kayaking, sewing and volunteering in my granddaughter’s school with the art program. We have three children and one grandchild.  Our granddaughter, Sarah, started competitive swimming last year at the age of six. This year as I was looking her times, I realized she had been swimming in a meter pool, and was actually beating my freestyle time while swimming one length.

I have swum in a lot of different parts of the world in all sorts of water temperatures, but a really memorable one was in 1994 when I swam in the Rio Grande near Terlinqua Texas.  It was pretty muddy and the water felt almost abrasive.  We were on an overnight rafting trip and I just wanted to swim.  I think that’s me – I just plain love to swim and MAC is the Best!!!

MAC Swimmers are the greatest advertisements of all! We love how you share your stories on social media, with friends, etc. We would like to share your stories as well. Each week we will highlight a MAC Swimmer so we can learn more about the team.

Monthly Feature Article:

Dryland Training:
Love it or hate it, you need it!

By: Maria Veen
• Owner and Coach, The Mighty Grind Endurance Systems LLC
• Certified Professional Triathlon Coach, ITCA
• Certified Level 3 Masters Coach, USMS

We know we should make time for it but we don’t

As I work on stroke technique with my swimmers, I’ll often recommend dryland exercises pertinent to the errors in the strokes.  Most often I get reluctance rather than willingness;  the swimmer would rather swim, the runner hates the gym, and the triathlete can’t find the time to fit it in.

All professional athletes spend time working on strength and conditioning to help their performance.  Football teams always have a weight room.  Dara Torres spent more time doing functional training in the gym than in the pool in her Olympic comeback year.  Ryan Lochte made huge gains in his swimming prior to the Rio Olympics and he attributed it all to strength training.  Tiger Woods regularly hits the gym.  I even used to train with a PBA pro at the workout studio.  If you want to see huge improvements, you need to do more than just swim (or bike or run).

Benefits of Strength and Conditioning

There are three different ways that strength and conditioning training can help you.  First, you can more effectively build strength with targeted exercises on land.  You need resistance to build strength in the muscles and ligaments. Although we can do some sets to build strength in the pool like pulling, tombstone kick, or buckets, it’s not nearly as effective.  Using your body weight or adding dumbbells or medicine balls offers more resistance than we can achieve in the water.  Explosive movements such as plyometrics and balance are also much more effective in the gym than in the pool. CONTINUE READING.. CLICK HERE

Weekly Featured Workout:

Spooky Halloween Workout

Warm-up:

200 Free + 100 Back + 100 Breast

-100s (50 scull, 50drill)

100 Free + 50 Back + 50 Breast

-50s (25 scull, 25drill)

1 x 400 Evil Free Swim

No wall turns. Turn at the “T” WITHOUT touching the bottom.

Every 4th length Fly w/ Breast kick.

7 x 50’s of Progressive Pain (w/zoomers)

25 zombie catch-up BK + 25 Free Strong

# of Dolphins at the turn as follows:

#1- 2 #2 – 4

#3 – 6 #4 – 8 #5 – 10 #6 – 12 #7 – 2

Tombstone to Zombie Kicking – 6 x 50’s @ :20 RI (w/zoomers and board)

25 tombstone kick

25 kick on back hold board straight up in the air

Swim – 6 x 100 Insane IM’s & Sanity Free @ :20 RI

Odd 100’s – Insane IM’s. Use different kick for each stroke

Fly w/ Flutter kick

Back w/ dolphin kick

Breast w/ flutter kick

Free w/ Breast kick

Even 100’s – drop a stroke per 25 throughout each of the 3x100s

Suffocating Pull of Death – 3 x (3 x 50’s Pulling)

1st round: 5-4-3 breaths per 50, lower lanes start at 6-5-4

2nd round: 4-3-2 breaths per 50

3rd round: 3-2-1 breaths per 50

4 x Screamer 50’s @ 1:30 or 2:00

25 easy+25 fast

Let out a blood curdling Scream or witch’s cackle at the turn

4×25 Warmdown Siamese Twins – Hold hands with partner and swim FR!

Many of you have experienced the MAC family of support over the years. We want to spread that out and give back to others. We would like to get MAC together and do one service project every Fall and one every Spring in our local community. Some of you attend churches, temples, or are active in other groups like the Lions Club or Chamber of Commerce that help families or individuals in need. Others may just know someone through friends that could use a little extra help. If you have an idea or know someone please e-mail Kris at macswimgoblue@gmail.com.

Spread The Word:

Share the fun and fitness we have created at MAC!.  We now have a flyer available on deck. It gives details about MAC and MAC Lite. Thank you for being a part of the MAC Family!  To view the flier, CLICK HERE for a printable PDF.

Upcoming Events:

Saturday, Nov. 16th, South Lyon Swim Meet
Visit: MichiganMasters.com for more information

Saturday, Dec 7th, Dewitt Swim Meet
Visit: MichiganMasters.com for more information

Saturday, Dec. 14th, MAC Reindeer Games

Friday & Saturday, Dec. 27-28 MAC Clinics

For a complete list visit our website