Monday, December 8, 2008

Grizzly Award

So we give out an award on a weekly basis throughout the season. I call it the grizzly award, which is based on the saying - "if you're going to be a bear - be a grizzly!" To me it means, be as big and strong as possible in whatever you do.

(And, yes, MHC's mascot is the Lyon's not bears, but I just like the saying!)

So recent winners include:

Amanda McGrosky
Isa Wismann-Horther
Morgan Herrell

This weeks winner though is senior and co-captain Natalia Sadaniantz. We host the Pioneer Valley Invitational. The meet is fun and un-scored. This allows the swimmers to swim as many events as they would like. Every year, there are a couple of people that swim all 19 events. Natalia has taken that one step farther and swam all 19 events for all 4 years! Pretty cool and definitely grizzly like!

Best,
DA

Mount Holyoke Alumnae Magazine

Here is the link to the Mount Holyoke Alumnae Association. Right in the middle of the page is the link for the most recent alum magazine. Always interesting articles and information.

Best,
DA

Monday, December 1, 2008

Lyon of the Week

Just a quick (and slightly delayed) update. Lindsay Schonborn was named "Lyon of the Week" for November 10-16th for her performance at the Regis Invitational. Lindsay tied two other swimmers from U. of New England for High Point Swimmer of the Meet with 2 first-place finishes and 1 second-place finish.

Here is the MHC story.

Best,
DA

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Ted Mullins Hour of Power

The team joined the Ted Mullins Hour of Power Relay for the first time this year. This was the third anual event and drew the largest number of teams and participants. Most of the teams were from colleges, but others included high school and club.

More information about the event can be found at the Carleton College web site.

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

More video

The season is flying along and I apologize for not keeping up on the blog. Lot's to do at this time of the year.

Anyway, here are two more videos from our team building trip.

Enjoy,
DA





Tuesday, November 4, 2008

A Video!!

Finally figured out the glitch. I was composing in the wrong window. So here is 1 video - more to come.


Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Team Challenge Course

The team took to the woods of Vermont on October 18th for a day of team building and tree hugging - quite literally. We traveled to Brattleboro, VT to the High 5 Outdoor Center. It was an absolutely beautiful fall day and very successful trip for the team. Here are a number of videos from the day (including some of the tree hugging :)

So technical difficulties have killed the videos for now. I will try to reload tomorrow. DA

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Team GPA

So it is official - the team's GPA of 3.59 in the spring ranked us #1 in the country for DIII women's teams! We are really excited to be on the top of the rankings and congrats to all of the swimmers and divers for their academic success!!

Here is the link to the CSCAA list. Here is the link for the Mount Holyoke Story.

Best,
DA

Thursday, September 25, 2008

Swim Clinic

We held a very successful swim clinic on Saturday, September 20th. There were 27 swimmers in attendance for the all-day stroke and turn clinic.

Ten team members spent they day going over the finer points of technique for each stroke and starts and turns. We also video taped the swimmers strokes underwater for review.

The program was part of our fundraising and was very successful. We will be scheduling another clinic for late spring.

Thanks to everyone who attended.

Best,
DA

MHC Featured in 2009 Princeton Review Guide

Mount Holyoke College is one of the nation's best institutions for undergraduate education, according to The Princeton Review Guide's just-published 2009 edition of its annual book, The Best 368 Colleges. Its rankings place the all-women's liberal arts college in the company of Harvard, Princeton, and Stanford Universities when it comes to the quality of both the students' classroom experience and the College library.

See the Mount Holyoke story here

Here is the link to the Princeton Reivew

Best,
DA

Saturday, September 13, 2008

Sign Up for MHC Athletic E-News

So the Mike Raposo has now linked his press releases to an RSS feed. When you sign up, you will receive notices for every article that is posted on our athletic web site. Go here to sign up. You can also look on the athletic page on the right hand side for the link.

It is a great way to keep up with Mount Holyoke's teams!

Best,
DA

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Friends of Athletics Newsletter

Click here for the most recent Friends of Athletics Newsletter.

Best,
DA

Friends of Athletics Golf Tournament

The 11th Annual Friends of Athletics Golf Tournament was held on Monday, September 8th, at The Orchards. The Orchards was the host of the 2004 U.S. Women's Open.

As has been the tradition, it was an absolutely beautiful late summer day for the tournament - blue skies and in the low 80's. Unfortunately that is about what our foursome shot! Actually it was even par with a 71, but far below our expectations. All said and done, Eric, Lou, Dennis and myself had a great time.

We would like to thank Ron Good and United States Sports Camps for once again sponsoring a hole for the tournament. Some of the donation is directed to Friends of Athletics, and some is directed to the team.

Here is more information on Friends of Athletics and the Tournament.

Best,
DA

Friday, September 5, 2008

Athletic Bar-B-Que

The Athletic Department held our annual "Welcome Back" barbecue on Thursday night. The event included comments by President Creighton, Athletic Director Laurie Priest, and our very own Lisa Nash! Lisa is one of our tri-captains this year (along with Betsy Lucker and Natalia Sadaniantz) and also the chair for SAAC (Student Athletic Advisory Committee). The event also included karaoke - click here for a few pictures.

We also held our first team meeting before the barbecue and had almost forty people in attendance! That is by far our largest meeting in the last few years. Although not all of the people in the meeting will join the team, it certainly a fantastic start!

Best,
DA

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

MHC Athletic Video

Here is link to a video about MHC athletics and the improvements under way to Kendall Dance and Sports complex.

Enjoy!
DA

Convocation

Mount Holyoke kicked off the new year with Convocation today. It was a beautiful summer day to be sitting in the amphitheater and welcoming the incoming class of 2012. Here is a link to the news story.

We are looking forward to the start of the semester and especially the season. The team will start practices on September 29th and we are really looking forward to using the updated pool.

Events between now and then include our first meeting on Thursday, which is immediately followed by the Athletic Department Bar-B-Que.

We will also by holding our swimming lessons starting on the 15th and holding a stroke and turn clinic on September 20th. Turns out we are pretty busy even when we are not practicing!

Check out our competition schedule for 2008-2009 here.

More updates soon.

Best,
DA

Friday, August 8, 2008

Swim Clinic Information

Below is the information for our upcoming Swim Clinic. Please let me know if you have questions. I can be reached at 413-538-2314 or dmallen@mtholyoke.edu

Mount Holyoke College – Stroke and Turn Clinic

WHEN: September 20th, 2008 9:00 - 3:30

WHERE: KENDALL HALL, MOUNT HOLYOKE COLLEGE

TOPICS: The stroke clinic will cover all four competitive strokes, as well as starts and turns. Each stroke will be covered using stroke drills, college swimmer demonstrations and videotape review. The newest drills and techniques will be introduced.

WHO’S ELIGIBLE: Competitive swimmers between 8 years old and senior in high school. All swimmers must be able to complete 25 yards in the four competitive strokes. Cost is $50.00 per swimmer.

INSTRUCTORS: Instructors will include head coach Dave Allen and members of the Mount Holyoke Swim Team. Coach Allen has coached YMCA, high school and college teams and has 21 years of experience in running clinics and camps throughout the country. He is a Certified Athletic Trainer and a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist. Team members specializing in each stroke will demonstrate drills and provide feedback to participants.

WHAT TO BRING: Swim suits, 2 caps, goggles, 3 towels, brown bag lunch, shorts/T-shirt or warm-ups.


APPROXIMATE SCHEDULE:
8:30-9:00 - Registration
9:00-10:15 - Freestyle Techniques
10:15-11:30 - Backstroke Techniques
11:30-12:00 – Lunch
12:00-1:15 - Butterfly Techniques
1:15-2:30 - Breaststroke Techniques
2:30-3:00 – Turns
3:00-3:30 - Starts

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

REGISTRATION FORM

NAME: __________________________ AGE:________________________

ADDRESS: _____________________________________________________

CITY: ________________________ STATE: _________ ZIP CODE: _______


PHONE NUMBER (In case of emergency): _____________________________________________________


Make checks payable to: Mount Holyoke College ($50.00 per swimmer)

Return Form to: Dave Allen, Kendall Hall, Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, MA 01075

Questions: 413-538-2314 or dmallen@mtholyoke.edu

Thursday, July 31, 2008

Grace Bauer Video

Hi All,

This past semester, senior Grace Bauer was selected to be part of a student profile video. It is basically a "day in the life" of Grace (just so you know it doesn't end with 100+ measures of an E major - get the reference?)

All the best!

DA

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Scoreboard Video

The updates are finally complete and we are ready to kick off the 2008-2009 season. I am completely amazed at how well everything came out and how great the pool looks now! We have a "new pool".

Video below shows the new scroeboard and parts of timing systyem that was installed last week. Thanks to Tac and everyone at Colorado Timing for their help in getting the scoreboard up.

I would also like to thank all of our Facilities Management crew that helped with this project, including (but not limited to!) Rick, Donny, Bob, Jim, Joe, Kenny, Don and Mike. My apologizes to those I may have left out!

Of course, the biggest thank you goes to David Wilson for his generous donation to update our facility!

Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Team GPA

So we have our team GPA for the Spring semester of 2008 and it is a whooping 3.59! We have submitted it to the College Swimming Coaches Association of America and it will receive the "All-American Academic Team Award" at the Superior level!

We now wait for our ranking among the other swim teams. We have been ranked as high as 3rd in Women's Division III Swimming with a GPA of 3.55. So we are crossing our fingers and hoping for a gold medal!

The submission deadline is September 1st, so we will not know until mid to late September. I'll post it as soon as I hear.

Best,
DA

Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Pool Additions

The pool renovations are just about complete. The bulkhead and blocks have been installed and the pool walls have been painted. The scoreboard and timing system will be installed next week and we will be done!

The additions have been great and we have put them to good use with the U.S. Sports Camps Swim Camps at mount Holyoke. We are just finishing up our 3rd and final week.

Check out the video of the pool.

Enjoy!

DA

Monday, June 2, 2008

Pool Renovations

So work is continuing on the pool and coming along nicely. The pool walls have been re-grouted and the pool area walls have been repainted. We are waiting for the delivery of the bulkhead and the construction should take about 2 weeks. After that, we will fill the pool and enjoy our new facility! Just in time for our 2008 camps.

I am off to Glacier National Park starting Wednesday, so posting will be limited over the next week. Of course I am a little behind anyway!

Enjoy!
DA

Thursday, May 15, 2008

Athletic Department Award Ceremony

Hmmmm - modern technology - this post should have been put up in May, but somehow it wasn't (couldn't be my fault!) Anyway, here is information about our awards ceremony in May!


Last Wednesday the Department of Physical Education and Athletics hosted it's annual Awards Ceremony for the Athletic Department. Each team has awards that are handed out at the ceremony.


The Swimming and Diving Team have 2 awards. The Noll Newcomer Award that recognizes a new member of the team for the significant contribution to the team.


The Ann C. Cummings Award recognizes the athlete that has contributed the most to the team.


Sophomore, Sarah-Brady Stack won the Noll Newcomer Award this year. She was a new swimmer this year, since she entered in the spring semester last year.


Senior Grace Bauer won the Ann C. Cummings Award.


Grace also was awarded the highest honor in the department, winning the Scholar-Athlete Award. This award is sponsored by the Alumnae Association and is given to a senior that represents the best of the meaning of the student athlete.

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

Pool Update

So the pool is now drained and under improvements. PC way to say construction. The tile has been wash and new tile is being laid in for new lane markers today and tomorrow. They will then re-rout the entire pool. The bulkhead should be arriving in the next 10 days. We are working hard to order all the equipment we need to get the pool up and running.

This includes new blocks, lane lines, timing system and scoreboard! The walls should also be painted in the next 2 weeks.

I am really excited to see all the work finished! It will be revitalized and top-notch facility in a couple of weeks!

Best,
DA

Quick Update

Hi All,

Sorry for the lack of posting recently. Finals just finished and it has been a busy time of the year. We had our annual team bar-b-q on May 4th and the Athletic Department Awards Ceremony on May 7th. I have also been very busy with writing and correcting the final for Sport Pedagogy as well as the last assignment, which was developing a list of drills for their individual sports.

More later!
DA

Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Swimming Faster - Stroke Rate

Looking back on our season, one of the best techniques we worked on was stroke rate. In hind sight, we should have done even more with it. I know we tapped into the potential, but we didn't utilize it to it's full potential.

Basically stroke rate is how fast you are moving your arms. It is the same as RPM (rotations per minute, but we call it strokes per minute, SPM). The more SPM you take, the faster you will go. Typically swimmers will tend to have too low of a SPM or the SPM will break down during a race. There is also a break point on the high end as well. When your stroke rate goes up too high, you start to lose the feel of the water and your speed will decrease.

The key is first making sure you have good technique established before you work on SPM. The best tool for the job is the Tempo Trainer by Finnis. It is basically a waterproof metronome. You set it for the tempo you want and either clip it on your goggle strap (with a clip provided) or tuck under your cap. We found it is easier to tuck it in the cap. From there the idea is to match your SPM to the beep of the tempo trainer. We found that the swimmers were able to increase their SPM and maintain that tempo during races.

If you don't have a tempo trainer, but have a metronome, you can always use that at the end of the pool. Just make sure to keep it dry!

More on this later.

DA

Friday, April 25, 2008

Pool Upgrades


We are in the final planning stages of of a number of upgrades to our pool. Mount Holyoke's pool was built as a 25-meter pool and a separate 40' X 60' diving pool. The diving pool has been great for our divers with a separate and dedicated pool for their practices. It is also kept a couple of degrees warmer than the swimming pool.

The one challenge was the swimming pool was 25-meters, which is counter to the NCAA swimming in yards. This is now going to change shortly. Thanks to a very generous donation, we will now have a fixed bulkhead to make the pool 25 yards. In addition to the bulkhead, we are also installing new Paragon blocks, replacing our Colorado Timing System and upgrading our scoreboard to a 10 line LED board. We are also painting the walls during the project.

We will start draining the pool on May 7th, the day after classes end. We expect to have all of the work completed by the middle of June, just in time for U S Sports Camps swim camps to begin.

This is a very exciting time for the team and college. We are also looking forward to hosting a number of meets for outside groups!

These renovations will make Mount Holyoke's auditorium the premier facility in Western Massachusetts.

All the best,
DA

Monday, April 21, 2008

Relay for Life

The Team participated in the American Cancer Society's Relay for Life on Friday and Saturday, April 18-19th at Amherst College. The relay is the 6th annual event for the 5-colleges. Over 1,000 people participated and the event raised over $125,000 for the ACS! Our team of 11 raised $1,600l.

We were fortunate enough to have beautiful weather for both Friday and Saturday and everyone had a great time.

Certainly, one of the most poignant was the survivor lap at the beginning of the event. Watching a couple of students participate in that lap certainly puts life and all of it's challenges in perspective!

I hope to post some pictures from the event in the next couple of days.

DA

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Swimming Faster

Just like the mantra in real estate - "location, location, location", to swim faster it is technique, technique, technique!

As your speed in swimming increases, so does the resistance from the water against your body. Unfortunately, the resistance increases exponentially! So it literally becomes much harder to go faster as you go faster!

The challenge then is to make your body as efficient as possible. This comes through working on technique as much as possible.

I believe most coaches spend too much time having young or inexperienced swimmers swim laps for conditioning, which often forces them into bad habits. It is a much better use of a coaches time to work with drills to teach technique. Of course you are also working on conditioning at the same time.

What is the easiest measure of efficiency in swimming - STROKE COUNT. Count how many strokes it takes for you to swim a length of the pool. From then on the goal is to lower that number as much as possible. (You can go slower by taking too few strokes, but most swimmers do not have that problem.)

So the next time you are in the pool, count your strokes to get a base line of how efficient you are at each stroke. Then start to work on lowering that number.

More later!
DA

NEWMAC Sportsmanship Award

This is the second year in a row the Mount Holyoke Swimming and Diving Team has won the conference sportsmanship award. (which makes sense, since the award is only in it's second year!)

The award is voted on by all of the student-athletes in the conference and is given to the team that shows the best sportsmanship during the conference championships.

This is a great honor for the team and a reflection on how we run our program. We want to compete and win, but do not believe we can also show great sportsmanship at the same time. It is something we talk about from day 1 in the program and it is clearly paying off!

Sunday, April 13, 2008

Welcome to the new MHC Swim Dive blog

So, this is the first day of the new blog about Mount Holyoke Swimming and Diving. The space will include a variety of information that family and friends will find informative and entertaining. I look forward to posting team information as well as pictures and video in the coming weeks.

Best,
DA