Coach's+Thoughts

Thoughts from Coach Small... ~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 8/28/13 Hello all, I hope summer has been great for all (or, for a few more hours, IS going great!). First....to all the seniors from last year....I hope your transition is going well. I suspect it is. Your presence in the pool and more importantly on the deck will be missed this upcoming year. I wish you well and will be in touch soon. Second....I haven't yet 'purged' my email list. I will, so I apologize to those of you who wish to be removed from the list. Third....and the reason to reach out today, is to let you know practice hours this year. We will be practicing Monday through Friday from 2:30-4:30. It looks as though Windham and BE will change practice hours from year to year. So....what does that mean. It means we will go back to bussing swimmers at 2:10 over to practice and we will be in the water early and home in time to have dinner with your family. I hope this info helps as you mentally prepare for the school year AND for the swim season. Take care and I look forward to seeing you soon. Pete Small ~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 1/31/13 Hello all, So, here is a bit of information about Southwesterns. Southwesterns is our regional championship….think ‘Western Maine Championship”.
 * ~ = //WINDHAM SWIMMING AND DIVING// = ||

Friday’s meet is Boys only (only boys travel…but ALL boys travel). Saturday is Girls only (only girls travel…but ALL girls travel).

The meets are a bit longer than a normal meet. The boys meet should end about 8:30ish Friday night and the girls should end about 7:30 on Saturday.

You received the ‘psych sheet’ in an earlier email. This is a list of all swimmers entered in individual events and teams entered in relay events. No changes can be made to the individual events yet we can add anybody to the relays. We must declare who swims the relays about 30 minutes prior to the relay. From the psych sheet, the heats will be constructed. The top 6 times will be in the final heat. The next 6 times in the ‘next to last heat’ and so on.

Awards will bill given to the top finishers in each event during the meet. Team awards are given out at the end of the meet.

Admissions is charged! Programs are available for a small fee. And crowds will be large, so arrive early for a seat.

Here is our time table: Tonight—practice 4:30-6:30 Tonight—team gatherings at the high school after practice Friday—Boys bus leaves the high school at 1:30! Boys warm ups 3:05-3:45 Meet begins at 5:00. Meet ends about 8:30. Estimated arrival back in Windham…10:00 No girls practice on Friday Saturday—Girls bus leaves the high school at 12:30 Girls Warm up begins at 1:45 Meet begins at 3:00 Meet ends about 7:00 Estimated arrival back in Windham….8:00-8:30

I may have left things out for which you have a question…PLEASE don’t hesitate to ask!

Thanks—take care, Pete ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 1/28/13 Hello, I hope everybody had an enjoyable weekend. We are now locked into the regional championship coming up this weekend. We have a fairly straightforward week (and warmer weather).

I believe the girls are getting together after practice on Thursday at school and the boys are also meeting in Room 107 after practice....a little shave down!

Monday--Practice 6:30-8:30 Tuesday--Practice 4:30-6:30 Wednesday--Practice 6:30-8:30 Thursday--Practice 4:30-6:30 Friday--Boys Southwesterns (warm up 3:00, meet at 5:00, bus will leave after school...time TBA) Saturday--Girls Southwesterns--Warm up at 1:00, meet at 3:00, bus time TBA).

I will send out the Southwestern program as soon as I receive it!

Enjoy the week, Pete Small ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 1/23/13 Hello all, I thought I'd take time to send out a number of items..... Tomorrow is our final dual meet of the year and our senior recognition night. The meet begins at 4:00 and I hope you can make it. We have 10 seniors to recognize and will go up against a tough Sanford girls team and a Sanford boys team on the rise. For some, tomorrow may be the last opportunity to swim in a meet.

Let me start by working backwards. Our final meet of the year is the State Championship meet. To swim in this meet in an individual event, one must qualify by eclipsing a 'standard' time. We have a number of people who have qualified. On the girls side, Alex Farinella and Holly Bair. On the boys side, Nick Sundquist, Joe Mycock, Joe Paluso, Lyle Webster, Sam Shoberg, Garrett Fraysier, Cole Moran, John Giberti, and Josh Blake. Each school may also submit one relay per relay event. This would mean that on the girls side, we will be bringing a minimum of 4 more swimmer with us and potentially 6 more swimmers. On the boys side, I don't envision us bringing more than those who have qualified. I wish we could bring the entire team, as we used to do, but deck space prohibits that and we can now only bring those swimmers who are competing.

Southwestern Championships is a regional championship hosted by the Officials Association. This meet has different entry limits than all other meets. Instead of each swimmer being able to compete in a max of four events, Southwesterns has each swimmer competing in a max of three events. Each team is limited to three entries per event and two relays per relay event. Obviously more people can swim this meet than at the state meet, but due to limitations, not everybody will swim. On the girls side I see about 20 girls swimming in this meet. On the boys side, we only have 19 boys and almost all of them will swim. We will submit our entries to this meet by THIS Sunday at noon and once submitted, they can not be changed!

Which brings us to the Sanford meet. We will have a number of people chasing State-cut times, a number of people swimming events that they might not have competed in, and everybody will have a number of events they are competing in. Everybody has demonstrated great improvement in the previous two weeks. From technique to times, things are falling into place!

So our schedule for the next week and a half (which can always be found on our web-site!) is as follows: Wed Jan 23--Practice 6:30-8:30 Thur Jan 24--Meet at home against Sanford, 4:00 Start Fri Jan 25--Practice 6:30-8:30 Sat Jan 26--Practice 11:30-1:00 Mon Jan 28--Practice 6:30-8:30 Tue Jan 29--Practice 4:30-6:30 Wed Jan 30--Practice 6:30-8:30 Thur Jan 31--Practice 4:30-6:30 Friday Feb 1--Boys SWesterns; Girls practice 6:30-7:30 (tentative) Sat Feb 2--Girls SWesterns

Many people will find that their practices will be shortened and that they are only swimming for about 60-75 minutes and are then done. This is all part of resting up prior to the final meet of the year...Taper time! Practices look different and unfortunately I can't always give a heads up that somebody might be done at 6:00 instead of 6:30, etc. etc. When I can, I'll let people know.

I hope all is well and I look forward to seeing you at the Sanford meet tomorrow. Take care, Pete Small

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 1/11/13 Hello all, A couple of quick items... Our meet today will have a few differences from our other meets. First, the girls are swimming South Portland. The boys are facing South Portland and Cape. (The Cape girls are facing McAuley today, their boys have been added to our meet). This means that, similar to our first meet of the year, the boys team is more limited in swims today, as we have only 2 lanes per event to use. The scoring of the meet is a bit different as well. The pool is a 25 meter pool. This means that the 500 free is now a 400 free (the only event in which the distance changes), and times you see on the scoreboard will be a bit different. As a VERY OVERSIMPLIFIED approximation (I can give you the exact formula for each event and distance if you want it), subtract 3 to 3.5 seconds for the 50, 6.5-7 seconds for the 100, and about 14 seconds for the 200 to get an APPROXIMATE time in yards. Next Saturday's meet against Greely has a new starting time. The meet will begin at 5:30 with Windham warming up at 5:00. The were generous to shift around their practice times to accommodate us last night! Hopefully you have been using the team's web-site. windhamswimminganddiving.wikispaces.com This site has just about everything you need want for our team! You can also visit maineswimming.wikispaces.com to look at all meet results and the top times throughout Class A and B. See you at the meet, Pete ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 1/7/13 Hello, A few items... 1) I have a pair of glasses which were left on the window sill at practice today. I'll bring them to school tomorrow (I'll have them in my room). I assume somebody will need them tomorrow. 2) A reminder to seniors that the Officials Scholarship Application is due next week, for anybody who wishes to apply. 3) Go Irish! Pete ~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 1/6/13 Hello all, I hope the weekend was nice. I am hoping for a warmer week and no snow days! We have had a number of days without practice...snow days, pool maintenance days, etc. We have been able to take advantage this week of Saturday and hold a practice on that day. We will also find pool time for practice on Thursday. For this week, note Thursday, Friday and Saturday! The week ahead: Monday--Practice 6:30-8:30 Tuesday--Practice 4:30-6:30 (bus from school at 4:00 for those who want/need it) Wednesday--Practice 6:30-8:30 Thursday--The St. Joseph's facility is unavailable due to a high school meet, so we have been able to secure practice time at Greely High School from 8-9:30. This is tentative at this time. I am still in the process of finalizing bus transportation, etc. However, you should be planning that swimming 8-9:30 is our first option...IF this falls through (which I am in great hopes it doesn't) then we will have a drylands practice after school at Windham High School. Friday--Swim meet at South Portland. The Girls are going up against South Portland. The boys are facing South Portland and Cape Elizabeth. Meet begins at 4:00, bus leaves Windham at 2:15. Saturday--Practice at St. Joseph's College from 9-11. Take care, Pete Small

~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 12/30/12 Hello all, I hope your weekend has been nice...snowy and colder, but nice. Thanks to Katie Dyer for the pizzas on the bus ride back Friday night and thanks to ALL who supplied drinks and chips, fruit, cookies, etc. for the ride back. The team greatly appreciated it after a meet with good swims. As soon as I have an electronic copy of the results, I'll send it along.

We will close out the shortest ever Windham winter training this week!

Monday--Practice at St. Joe's 9:00 AM to 11:00 AM Tuesday--no practice--Happy New Year Wednesday--Practice 4:30-6:30 (there will be a bus available after school, 4:00) Thursday--Meet against Yarmouth at St. Joe's...Bus at 2:15, Warm up at 3:00, meet at 4:00 Friday--Practice 6:30-8:30

Rest up tonight....stopwatch set tomorrow! ~*~*~*~*~*

Hello all, I hope your weekend is going well. It looks as though snow is on our doorstep!

Last week was a productive week for us. I think we had four good practices and an illuminating performance against Gorham.....we were able to watch many people swim events that are uncommon for them and I thought we performed better than expected. We've identified a few key areas for our improvement for this upcoming week. We also had a very productive fundraiser this Saturday. Many people sold enough to earn a deck bag or a jacket....we'll take those orders on deck Monday and I'll place the order on Tuesday morning!

We have two home meets this week. On Tuesday we host Bonny Eagle. The Scots are a program which is growing in participants and talent. We should see strong races for both females and males. We'll need to be ready to race. On Thursday, we take on one of the stronger programs in our conference and in the state, Cheverus. The boys team is being mentioned as one of the top three in Class A (with Bangor and Cape) and the girls are always strong. This meet has historically been a high energy, tough racing meet. Thursday will be a great meet to see.

A note regarding the weather....Keep in mind that if school is canceled, it does not mean that practice is canceled. While weather on any given day may be hazardous at 9:00AM, it may be fine by noon. We will send out emails, update facebook, send messages, etc. to let you know if practice is canceled. I ask that everybody assume practice is ON until you hear that it is canceled.

Monday--Practice 4:30-6:30 (bus is available at 4:00) Tuesday--meet at St. Joe's, bus leaves school at 2:15, warm up at 3:00, meet begins at 4:00 Wednesday--Practice 4:30-6:30 (bus is available at 4:00) Thursday--meet at St. Joe's, bus leaves school at 2:15, warm up at 3:00, meet begins at 4:00 Friday--Practice 4:30-6:30 (bus is available at 4:00)

And how's this for perspective on how quickly the season is moving along....only 7practices left in December and only 25 total practices prior to Southwestern Championships!

Please let me know if you have any questions, concerns, etc.! 11/26/12 Hello, I hope everybody has had a nice weekend. Looks as though the cold weather is now upon us. A nice week of practices are behind us. We focused upon the very basics in the pool and introduced drylands on Friday. Fundraising information and cards were distributed on Wednesday. Here is a look at the week ahead: Monday--Practice 6:30-8:30 Tuesday--Practice 4:30-6:00. The 6:00 end time is a change. We have our annual 'Meet the coaches' night on Tuesday night at the Windham High School Auditorium. This program begins at 6:30. We will end our practice at 6:00 so that the student-athletes, as well as parents, can head on over to the auditorium. We meet in a large group first with a guest speaker as part of the program, and then we will break out into sport groups (swimming and diving) and hold a brief parent-focused meeting. Wednesday--Practice 6:30-8:30 Thursday--Practice 4:30-6:30 Friday--Practice 6:30-8:30 A few things to keep in mind: 1) It is colder out....dress for the weather. We don't want to see people getting sick and missing training time. 2) A bus will leave from the high school at 4:00 on Tuesday and Thursday to bring people to practice. Hopefully this allows people the opportunity to head back after school with teachers and gives people a chance to take care of their academics. 3) You are required to notify one of the coaches PRIOR to practice if you are not there due to illness, etc. 4) Start early on selling the Dunkin Donuts coupon books. Everybody is required to sell 10 books. If you need more books, see me! If you have sold all 10 and want the money out of your hands now, see me! 5) Order forms for team apparel (deck shirt and shorts) will be distributed Monday at practice and needs to be returned Tuesday at practice! And I think that is all for now. I hope everybody has an enjoyable Sunday. 11/18/12 Hello, Just over 30 hours and we begin the 2012-2013 swim season! A few notes for each day: Monday--Practice at St. Joe's from 6:30-8:30. Please arrive by 6:10. We will meet in the lobby of the Alfond Center to meet with the Facilities Manager, Maureen Lasalle and the Aquatics Director Lisa Pardi who want to welcome us to the facility. Tuesday--Practice at St. Joe's from 4:30-6:30 Wednesday--Practice at St. Joe's from 9-11. Please arrive no later than 8:40 as we will be meeting with our fundraising coordinator and kick off our fundraising! Thursday....no practice...Happy Thanksgiving. Friday-Practice at Windham High School 8-10 AM. We will be beginning our drylnad training program. Please come with t-shirt, shorts, sneakers for this practice. Hopefully everybody is all set and as excited as Coach Haibon, Coach Abbott and I are. I look forward to seeing you tomorrow!! Take Care, Pete Small