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Behind the Blocks: NCAAs or bust tracks the training and development of former All Met swimmers working towards the goal of making the NCAA Division I championship meet in March during the 2013-2014 season. Each week the swimmers will post a personal blog about training with their respective school’s swim program and the daily challenges of life as a student-athlete at the D1 level. Check back every Tuesday for new blog posts, and join us throughout the season for a behind-the-scenes look at some of the country’s elite collegiate swimmers and swim programs.
Eva Greene is a junior at the University of California-Berkeley. She started her swimming career with the Tuckahoe Tigers in the NVSL and continued with McLean High School where she was MVP from 2008-2011. She was named PVS Swimmer of the Year in 2009 as a member of Machine Aquatics. Read all of Eva’s blog posts here.
It’s time! We’ve made it! Tomorrow the Bears head to Hawaii for the best time of the season. The past few days we’ve been in Berkeley training hard and having a fun time hanging out in an empty city. Tomorrow though, that will change. Goodbye fog and 45-degree weather, hello 80 degrees and sunny. It couldn’t be any better.
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One of my favorite things about this week in Berkeley is not having school and being able to relax a bit with my teammates. Since the freshmen have to move out of the dorms, they live with an upperclassman in their apartment or house, which adds another exciting element to this week of training.
It’s been especially fun having me, my two roommates Taylor Nanfria and Mckenna Kurz, along with freshman Kristen Vredeveld all together in our cozy apartment.Our days are a nonstop sleepover with The Bachelor consuming most of our chatter.
In terms of swimming, this time of the year we shift into a different mode of training. In the fall we focus more on establishing an aerobic and cardio base, but the spring is all about racing.
From August up until Christmas break our workouts tend to be a little bulkier with less variation in terms of sets that are stroke or distance specific. We do spin classes and cardio dance to supplement what we’re doing in the pool, and our weights workouts are usually metabolically and heart rate oriented. This phase of the season is both mentally and physically difficult because it seems like we never ease up. Doing all this work early, however, makes me feel even stronger and more powerful as we phase into spring sessions.
Beginning in January, we change it up quite a bit. Our coaches’ goal is to make us feel like athletes, not just swimmers. We continue with traditional swim workouts, but we also do more station work. This consists of splitting into different groups based on strokes and distance. I am usually placed in the backstroke or mid-distance group, and occasionally (when I’m lucky) with the sprinters.
Our stations might look something like this: one group swimming a set with Teri, one group doing an underwater set with Kristen, one group doing dryland, and one group doing resistance cords. We’ll do each station for 15-20 minutes before rotating.
I absolutely love this time of the year. Training is challenging but fun and exciting. The fast pace racing brings out the competitor in me. We’re able to hone in on our individual skills in order to build on our strengths and improve our weaknesses.
The most difficult thing about this circuit-style training is that we are expected to be pushing ourselves 100% the entire time. Each station is a new start where it does not matter what we just did or what we’re about to do, so holding back or saving up is never an option. However, this is also the best part about this type of training. If I didn’t do as well as I wanted in one station, I have the opportunity to reset and attack the next one. It also prevents me from entering into that mindless-swim-practice zone that sometimes comes with longer sets.
Competing on any team requires a lot of trust and togetherness. Enduring this journey creates friendships that last a lifetime and bonds that transform a group of individuals into one cohesive and killer unit. In my opinion, winter training is one of the most crucial points in making this a reality. Being together without school in the picture allows us to spend valuable time as a team in a different environment. The actual environment – Hawaii – doesn’t hurt either!
Aloha and GO BEARS!
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