January 2014

Happy New Year! We're pleased to unveil a new look for our monthly STREAMLINES newsletter. Remember, you can adjust your preferences for receipt of these publications at the bottom of this email. Please don't hit "unsubscribe" or we won't be able to contact you about other member business, such as your registration, Nationals meet entries, urgent rule changes, and other important updates. See the "About STREAMLINES" blurb at the bottom for more.

 

Oh, Those Prerace Jitters!

Butterflies in your stomach, sweaty palms, racing heartbeat, and dry mouth-these are the calling cards of "nerves" that all competitors have probably felt before a race. They're not pleasant, but the key is to use those jitters to your advantage; don't let them overwhelm you.

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Do-Bee Drills Worth Doing

As a child, long before Sesame Street was on TV, I watched an educational show called Romper Room. Frequently, a large bumblebee character called Mr. Do-Bee presented good and inappropriate behaviors to young viewers. These behaviors were called "Do-Bee's" and "Don't-Bee's." Perhaps not surprisingly, the "Don't-Bee's" always led to disastrous consequences. Amazingly, Romper Room philosophy can be applied to Masters swimming.

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Go the Distance in 2014

Back for another year in 2014 is the ever-popular Nike Go the Distance

fitness event. It's easy (and free) to participate and the more you swim, the more prizes you earn. Sign up via your MyUSMS page and enter a goal number of miles you'd like to swim this year. Then, update your FLOG (Fitness Log) to keep track of how far you've swum. If you're curious about how you stack up, you can check the daily results, which includes everyone in the GTD program. Don't forget to update your FLOG regularly. You'll win useful prizes from Nike for some of the bigger milestones you cross: a free cap at 50 miles, a drawstring bag at 250 miles, and a Nike suit at 500 miles. You can do it!

Open Water Festival?

Should USMS offer an Open Water National Championship Festival? We want to hear from you! Take our survey and let us know what you think. Currently, our OW National Championship events are held in different locations across the country on different dates.

Are You in the Top 10?

USMS publishes the official Top 10 swims for each age group, both individual and relay, for SCY, SCM, and LCM on the USMS website three times annually. If you are among the Top 10 and if you'd like to commemorate your accomplishment, you can order an official USMS Top 10 patch. Most years back to 1982 are available.

Mighty Monofin

When most people think of a monofin, they probably visualize a mermaid gracefully undulating through a fictional underwater paradise. Not just the stuff of fairytales, this large, single-blade fin can be found on pool decks around the country and has contributed to many Olympic gold medals.

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This Aquatic Life

USMS member Patrick Weiss (right) and 18 other Masters swimmers got to spend lots of quality time with some major names in swimming while getting high-powered coaching and training at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Col. during a recent USA Swimming Foundation Fantasy Camp. Rowdy Gaines, Janet Evans, Ricky Berens (left), Coach Dave Marsh, and Mel Stewart were all on hand to help camp participants rise to the next level. And Weiss even got to try on Berens's Olympic gold medal. Looks like a good fit!

 

Have a great image and a story to go with it? Send it to press@usms.org.

Trimmer, faster, better swimmer

New York resident Bob Unger, 56, swims with the Seawolves Masters in the Metropolitan LMSC. He started as a middle distance runner in high school and college, but an injury and life got in the way of his keeping up with running. About 20 years ago, he suffered a vertebral fracture, which went undiagnosed until relatively recently. As he got older, the pain worsened and his middle thickened. He tried to get back into running, but the pain was too great. He decided to try swimming instead. He had swum as a kid, but had never really developed a strong interest in it..

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About U.S. Masters Swimming

U.S. Masters Swimming, founded in 1970, is a membership-operated national governing body that promotes health, wellness, fitness, and competition for adults through swimming. It does so by partnering with more than 1,500 adult swim programs across the country; promoting information via the bimonthly member magazine, SWIMMER, monthly e-newsletters, STREAMLINES, and website, usms.org; and by sanctioning and promoting pool, open water, and virtual events and competitions. More than 59,000 adults are registered members of U.S. Masters Swimming.

About STREAMLINES

U.S. Masters Swimming encourages all USMS members to subscribe to STREAMLINES. However, if you would rather not receive this update, please do not click the "SafeUnsubscribe" link, as that will remove you from all other USMS National Office mailings. Rather, click on the "Update Profile/Email Address" link to manage your e-newsletter subscriptions to STREAMLINES, STREAMLINES for Coaches, and STREAMLINES for Volunteers, a bimonthly publication.

You'll probably swim an hour sometime this January anyway, so why not use that pool time to log some national competition as well? Just swim as far as you can in one hour, have someone write down your splits, submit your results, and be ranked with everyone in your age group across the country. 

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