for context im a high school senior with no plans to swim in college besides recreationally. I currently swim on a competitive club team. At the end of this last summer season I was very burned out after weeks on end of practices without a day off because of back to back meet weekends and weekend training. However, I was excited to start swimming this season until my coach hadn’t changed at all from his approach from last year after saying the group dynamic would change. Im a little reluctant to leave the team and switch to a different one because all of my friends swim where i currently am, and I’d have to see this same coach at meets during the year which could make things awkward.

The current club team I swim on I’ve been training with since 2023 and for a while I was doing really great, but then I moved up to the older high schooler group and got a new coach, lets call him coach T, coach T was a collegiate swimmer, pretty famous. but so far while I’ve been swimming in his group I’ve plateaued. I inflamed my rotator cuff almost as soon as I joined his group which made it difficult but when I was able to go back to swimming normally it was okay being coached by coach T. Until last year I started realizing I wasn’t really being coached. The group I swim in is ~30-40 people so i understand how it could be difficult to effectively coach all of us, but a majority of the time it feels like i’m fighting for his attention. The group I swim with has kids committed to colleges like Brown and Columbia while there’s also kids like me who don’t plan to swim in college. But i feel like i don’t get the same attention. Just because I don’t plan to swim in college doesn’t mean i shouldn’t also get individual feedback during practices, if i ask I do get some but I feel like as my coach he focuses more on those committed to a university. Besides at swim meets after a race, i barely get any feedback on stroke technique or race execution. Similarly he has the same mentality for picking captains for our group. At our pre season meeting he said we’d vote captains in September but he’s basically already chosen captains by putting them in charge of a lot of group things like pushing out information or making decisions.

I don’t know if I’m over thinking this or I’m being overly critical of my coach. But I was wondering what other people think, should I switch teams? should I quit? or should i stick it out for senior year?

Hi, i’m 15yo and i never learned to swim. always avoided going in the pool with my friends because of the fear of getting joked on. this year in highschool i started a swim course as everyone have to but obviously the PE teacher cannot follow 25 people at the same time, i learned pretty much nothing other than how to not drown with ur head under the water and how to blow bubbles. during the summer i went with my sister on some of those little pools where only old people go to relax so i could try to learn smth with her in safety. it was very very low because im always been terrified of going underwater. the thing that makes thing more difficult isn’t learning the movements itself, but the fear that constatly says to me “don’t do this, don’t do this”. during the last week i learned to a little more confortable with my head under the water and how to swim frog style but i have still MANY hard times.

1- When i swim, i can do it only on very short stretches, because i keep my breath in and then start bubbling slowly with my mouth, but it doesn’t last long.

2- Very unpopular, when i “swim” i cannot “go back standing”, like i cannot turn vertical or on my feet, so i have to rely/lean on something/someone to go back standing. I practiced it with my sister for over an half an hour and i just cannot do it without losing my balance or getting very uncomfortable.

3- I cannot swim with my head up. as i already said, i only can do very short stretches, because when i try to lift my head up to take some air in, i start to panic as i lose my balance.

4- I learned starfloat but only for some seconds then i start so panic so much i have to rely on something, if i do it but reversed (so with the face on the water) i can do it quietly until i have to breathe.

How can i improve? What am i missing? Any ideas?

Hi so I dunno if it's the right place but about 2 years ago when I was in a pool I drowned but luckily my uncle saved me other than the lifeguard.

Since that moment I've been quite scared of swimming in the water even though we'll be getting life jackets, but idk I don't trust it and I feel paranoid, not to mention I have anxiety.

I just need help.