Fun Relays!

I was a competitive swimmer for seven years and began coaching my senior year of high school. Altogether, I coached for five years. I have coached high school boys, middle school boys and girls, and elementary boys and girls. I think that coaching is rewarding in the fact that you can really see how much the kids have progressed after putting in so much hard work and dedication. I do believe that having a little fun in the process is completely okay!

When I coached a team called, Mini Marlins, it was a group of kids from the ages five to fourteen. We had a meet about every five weeks and they looked forward to them! Something that I tried to do at least a few times a year was have a fun meet. I would coordinate it with the other coaches and teams to make sure it was extra fun for the kids. We would also make it all relays so that the teams could work together and the ages could be all mixed up.

Some of the events of the meet would be:

·         Noodle relay

·         Freestyle relay with flippers

·         Freestyle relay with pull buoys

·         Backstroke relay with balancing a squirt toy on their head

·         Ascending or descending relay for instance: first swimmer 25 yards, second swimmer 50 yards, third swimmer 75 yards, last swimmer 100 yards

·         Tarzan relay (Freestyle with head out of the water)

·         Corkscrew relay (Backstroke/ freestyle combined to make a stroke)

·         Kicking relay (uses kickboard)

·         All backstroke/ breaststroke/ butterfly relays

·         Ballet leg relay

·         Dog relay

These are just some of the many relays that the kids would be able to participate in. I think that in order to have a strong team, the kids have to be able to have a little bit of fun together. It is amazing how the older kids would help the younger ones in these relays. They would all cheer for one another, because some of these relays are hard or easy for all the age groups. It is more of an even playing field for the swimmers.

For the noodle relay, the swimmers had to swim holding the noddle. Some swimmers would choose to stick it in between their legs; others would hold it with their arms. Regardless of how they held it, it didn’t matter, as long as they held it somehow.

 A freestyle relay with flippers is just as it sounds. The swimmers were able to use flippers when they swam. Likewise, in the pull buoy relay the swimmers had to have the pull buoy between their legs.

In the backstroke relay with squirt toys, I would have the swimmers balance a squirt toy on their forehead and swim backstroke. TIP: This is also a great technique for teaching rolling in backstroke! If the toy falls off, the swimmer has to place it back on his or her head before continuing to swim.

I would either do one or the other with an ascending or descending relay. Ascending the yards would go up as each swimmer swam and the opposite would happen for descending. This relay is a great opportunity to mix age groups. I would have my youngest swim the smallest amount of yards and my oldest swim the most amount of yards.

Tarzan and corkscrew are swimmer favorites. Normally, all the swimmers want to be in these two relays because they are so fun. Tarzan is just freestyle, but with your head out of the water. Corkscrew is one freestyle stroke and one backstroke stroke continuously alternating. Warning: corkscrew will make the swimmers dizzy! I would only have them swim 25 yards to 50 yards max with corkscrew. Anything more than that and it’s hard for the swimmers to even remotely stay in a straight line.

A kickboard relay is a relay using a kickboard. I would sometimes mix up the strokes and each swimmer would have to do a different type of kick. The first swimmer might do butterfly kick, the second backstroke kick, the third breaststroke kick, and the last freestyle kick. For backstroke, the swimmer would just kick on his or her back. This is a great way to mix it up! I have also had all the swimmers kick freestyle. Sometimes, I will have both types of relays depending on my swimmers. If I have an abundant amount of swimmers that like kicking I will add both types of relays in.

The all backstroke/ breaststroke/ butterfly relay is when each swimmer swims the same stroke in the relay. In regular competitions there are all freestyle relays. There aren’t any all breaststroke, backstroke, or butterfly relays, so I will try and mix it up by adding those strokes in as their own relay. Swimmers enjoy these relays and make great teams. All the swimmers who swim breaststroke as their main stroke get to swim together in a relay and they get excited about it. This also happens with breaststroke and butterfly.

Ballet leg relay is where the swimmers swim backstroke but with one leg out of the water. The leg that is out must be straight up in the air and pointed! This is both hard and fun for the kids to do.

Lastly, the dog relay is a lot of fun for the younger swimmers especially. They just swim doggy paddle for this relay. I will also have younger swimmers bark like a dog because they think it is hilarious. Occasionally, one of the kids will make a random cat noise which is always very funny. The swimmers get very excited to act like a dog in the water!

Swimming is a hard sport but it can be a fun sport! Sometimes letting the kids have fun is a wonderful way to build a strong team!

This is the noodle relay!