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Saturday, August 1, 2009
Mood:
 special
Topic: My 2009 Reflections
Seals,Congratulations on being the first Seals team to have a winning season in over a decade. Our team did well at championships holding our spot of 6th place, and nipping on the toes of our competitors. I am proud of our team and you all should be proud of yourselves. You all had a desire to improve and do well throughout the season. Every meet the Seals showed up with cheering and spirit; making everyone proud and happy to be wearing purple. Our parents supported both the team and swimmers giving our team the #1 spirited parents in the league. I am already looking forward to seeing all of you next year with Seal tattoos , hearing you chant for your team mates and wearing goofy costumes at themed meet. Next year we will have bigger and better trivia practices, cannonball contests, and birthday swims. And…next year I WILL be prepared when our 8 and unders attack me with water balloons at Family Fun Day. Thank you again for a fun, competitive, and improved year this year. If any questions arise during the off season about rules please e-mail our team on the web site.Gooooooooooooooooo Seals!!
Posted by Coach Ray
at 3:26 PM PDT
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Topic: Winning Season
Congratulations to all of our swimmers on our 4th win this season. This gives the Seals swim team our first winning record in 13 years! All the praise and recognition needs to go to our swimmers. They are the ones putting in the hard work for personal improvement. At the beginning of the season I told all our swimmers we grow as a team by each person doing their part improving over the course of the season. These are the results that have come from our swimmers doing their part on this team. Thank you to all of you!!!!!! The meet against Warm Springs was filled with surprises. There were relays that had broken records, at one point I noticed coach Robb’s mouth open wide with shock, because we still had swimmers dropping multiple seconds. In some cases swimmers were dropping 9 seconds in their events. Great job to our little kids doing the race training we have taught and also to our older kids for the vast improvement their turns. The season is not over yet. We have one more meet and two more weeks until champs! It is VERY IMPORTANT that everyone attend practice every day until champs. We are going to go over some detailed swimming instructions. I will also go over what to expect at champs in the next two weeks. At this point it is very important to get prepared early. I have already started the process with our swimmers regarding swimming their races for champs, but we need to start thinking about what happens out of the pool. I will go over all this information at practice with our swimmers. I encourage parents to listen in at the beginning of practice during our meetings because this will be helpful for you as well. Coach Ray
Posted by Coach Ray
at 3:47 PM PDT
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Mood:
 a-ok
Topic: Coaches Challenge
Seals, Great job this Saturday! Our team scored 100 more points than we did last year against Mission Valley. The most impressive part of the meet was your motivation. We had swimmers dropping times in multiple events. Whenever our coaches would turn around there was someone dropping two or in some cases three seconds off their personal bests. This is proof that POSITIVE results WILL happen during meets if you come to practice, pay attention, and work hard! Dropping time is exciting to see - you should feel proud about your accomplishments. I challenge you! Continue your efforts in becoming more efficient, stronger, and overall better swimmers. Set an overall target time to beat at the upcoming meets. Once you reach your goal – set a new one. Dropping time will help you be more competitive and contribute to the team’s overall performance. Our next two meets are against good teams. Let’s all rally together to make sure we show up and perform to the best of our ability. We are one victory away to having a winning record. The last time the Seals had a winning record was 13 years ago - we CAN have a winning record this year if we together --- GO FOR IT! Gooooooooo Seals.
Posted by Coach Ray
at 9:46 PM PDT
Updated: Tuesday, June 30, 2009 9:48 PM PDT
Monday, June 15, 2009
Mood:
 celebratory
Topic: It Feels Good to Be a Sea
Seals……….Right now, I agree with coach Andrew when he said, “It feels good to be a Seal.” This is truly a remarkable moment for the Seals swim team. We have not defeated the Stingrays in over 10 years and the Seals swim team has not gone 3-0 since the mid to late 90’s. You should all be very proud of yourselves for your contributions to these great achievements. This is a team effort - you are ALL making this happen! I am thrilled to be a member of this team and proud of you all. I was very impressed by our performances. Swimmers are coming through when we need them the most. And, there are a few age groups in particular that have positively shifted the momentum for our team. The 8 and under boys and girls swept almost all their events, the 13-14 boys came through where we needed them, and when you see our 15-18 girls, pat them on the back because they outscored their very fast opponents 60-48. While our swimming was superb, nothing was better than our team spirit. We had parents who were by the side of the pool cheering the entire meet, encouragement was behind the lanes from all our coaches, and the 10 and unders were filling the pool area with their chant, “Lets go Seals!” –clap-clap-clap-clap-clap. This kind of attitude and pride is what makes our team so special. Thank you all. Next meet is our night meet against the Newark Blue Fins. This will be a fun meet. Let’s once again - race fast and cheer enthusiastically.Gooooooooooooo Seals!!!
Posted by Coach Ray
at 3:01 PM PDT
Updated: Monday, June 15, 2009 3:05 PM PDT
Monday, June 8, 2009
Mood:
celebratory
Topic: Back to Back Wins
Hello Seals, Congratulations on our second win! This is the first time in over ten years the Seals have won their first two swim meets. I am very proud of our team and you should all pat yourself on the back for contributing to this accomplishment. AGAIN we had a lot of swimmers dropping time in their events. It is difficult in swimming to consistently drop time. If you are one of our many swimmers who have dropped time more than once since time trials; you have defeated the odds. During the meet I noticed a lot of spirited kids cheering for each other, and giving one another praise. When you get out and get your time, tell your coach’s, parents, friends, or all of the above how well you did. Do not expect to get your best time every meet, and is highly difficult in the swimming world. Our coach’s only get to see how you react to competitions 7 times this year, so don’t be discouraged if we have some feedback to help you. We want you to succeed in your races, and your practice swimming is very different from your races. As our team is becoming stronger we want to make sure we stay on track.
Parents and swimmers make sure you are attending practices. We will continue working on technique and teaching swimmers how to race. This is a very important step in improving. It takes a lot of practice and repetition in order to take your strokes and races to the next level. Our next meet is against the Glenmoor Stingrays. Their pool has 5 lanes and a gutter hole in lane 3. We will go over what to look for and how to swim in that pool. Congratulations Seals……
Posted by Coach Ray
at 6:47 AM PDT
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Mood:
 happy
Topic: A lot to smile about!
Hello Seals, What a great first meet! I think Coach Andrew summed it up perfectly, “We have a lot to smile about!” Great job to all our Seal pups for applying what they learned in practice into the meet. Our older Seals strokes looked efficient and they were all prepared with not one person missing a race. I hope all the swimmers were getting their times when they got out of the pool, because we had 3 out of 4 swimmers getting their best time out of each race!!!! You should all be very proud of yourself; it is very difficult to drop time in one event, let alone multiple events. If you were one of the swimmers who dropped more than one second on an event you should be thrilled. This meet will be very difficult to pick swimmer of the week. We have two months left before the season ends. It is absolutely mandatory swimmers come to practice in order to succeed and or improve on this team. Our time in the water is minimal. For example, our 8 and under swimmers will spend only 5 hours a week in the water. Missing two or three practices gives them a large disadvantage in order to improve properly. Parents and swimmers - we will be choosing the swimmers who will participate in the championship meet (100 swimmers) the first week of July. We will ask every swimmer who is available if they can still go to champs. Then we will choose 100 swimmers based on practice attendance, ability to score points, age group balance, and dedication. If you went to champs last year or the year before this does not guarantee you a spot on the roster. We will be posting the 100 the second week of July 3. Also at the Mission Valley meet (June 27) do not freak out if you don’t hear your child’s name called when they are swimming. We will be doing nicknames this meet. We will ask all the kids if they would like to go by a nickname on the meet sheet. Let’s keep up the hard work Seals….. Can I get a Seals Bark? Gooooooooooooooo Seals…
Posted by Coach Ray
at 3:55 PM PDT
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Mood:
 not sure
Topic: Practice Makes Perfect
Hi Seals, Practice times change May 11th. See the Seals website for details. Our time trial and first swim meet of the year will be approaching soon. We are now 25% complete with the swim season. I have noticed a huge drop off in practice attendance. I design every practice in order to prepare our swimmers for the swim season and meets coming up. Judging from a lot of our swimmers practice dedication a number of our swimmers will not be able to perform to their full potential when they start racing. I am highly recommending swimmers come to practice more often; it’s not too late for fine tuning before our meets start. This will give our coach’s the opportunity to bring the kids who have been missing up to speed with the other kids in their age group. Our goal is to make each swimmer improve. This can only happen if swimmers come regularly. Before time trials we will have a meeting with important information for all the swimmers on what to expect during time trials. Time trials will be run the same as a regular swim meet and will be a good time to see what a real swim meet is like. This will also be the day we receive times for all the kids so we can place them in events and heats based on their ability. Our coaches can have our hands full most of the time, but we would like to make ourselves available to our parents for any questions or concerns. Come to practice at either 5:30 pm or 8:30 pm on Thursday May 7th and we will hold a short introduction of what is to be expected in the future and also open it up for any questions. Great job to the following swimmers who have been trying really hard in our practices.***Sophia X, Rachel P , Justice, Mathew L, Katelyn F., Hamasseh, Vincent T, Julia D. ***
Posted by Coach Ray
at 12:10 PM PDT
Updated: Tuesday, May 5, 2009 12:14 PM PDT
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Mood:
happy
Topic: Week Three!
Hey Seals, Week three is here! The team is looking good, and our coach’s are excited about what they see. We have a lot of new swimmers catching on quickly to the Seals swim program, and our existing swimmers jumped right into the pool like they never left. These first 6 weeks are extremely crucial to the rest of the season. This is the time we correct each swimmers technique based on their ability. During this time all four coaches will be giving detailed instruction, feedback, and demonstrations giving our swimmers a solid base to start from. Swimmers, in order for you to be prepared for future practices based around racing, it is important that you come to practice prepared to learn. Listen to your coaches and think about what you are supposed to be doing each lap. We want all of you to have correct technique and legal strokes. Sometimes you hear us say the same thing over and over; this is because we need your help to correct your technique. Our coaches would like to recognize some of our Seals who had a great 2 weeks of practice. These swimmers have been coming to our practice and made huge improvements. *Sahil B., Kayla H., Katie F., Logan T., Logan M., Ellijah C., Luc M., Kiana P.* Goooooooooooo Seals!!
Posted by Coach Ray
at 1:45 PM PDT
Updated: Tuesday, April 21, 2009 1:49 PM PDT
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Mood:
 energetic
Topic: 2009-Another GREAT Season
Hello Seals, We have several new additions to the team and a lot of returning swimmers coming back. The parent meeting had a great turn out filled with excited parents and swimmers. This season we will have the same coaching philosophy as in 2008, consisting of a technique and race based season. Our coach’s believe that our team will get better one swimmer at a time. We do this by promoting structure in practices and swim meets. We give solid technique instruction, based off of positive encouragement.
I am really excited for the season to begin. This is my eighth year as a coach in the EBSL and the most confident with our team’s strength going into the season. All new swimmers -- our practices will be very different from swim lessons. There will be no coach’s in the water, but we will be by your side on the deck. If you have any questions during practice, or before let us know; we want every swimmer to understand what is being taught.
We should all expect three things this season. 1. Higher commitment 2. Improvement for each swimmer, leading to a more competitive Seals team 3. A whole lot of FUN!
Look out everyone the Seals are ready for another great season. Gooooooooooooooooo Seals!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by Coach Ray
at 4:16 PM PDT
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Hello Seals - 2009 Season!
Mood:
happy
Topic: Hello Seals - 2009 Season
We are approaching another fun filled competitive season. I hope you all had a great holiday and rest of summer in 2008. Last season we rocked the pool by jumping up 5 places and coming in 6th place. I don’t know about anyone else, but it is still making me smile :-)! Everyone will be anxious to see what we can do next in 2009. Our coach’s are going into this season with high hopes and a bigger game plan. Robb said he is ready to start fine-tuning everyone’s strokes. Andrew said he misses everyone and can’t wait to start helping people with their dives. We also have a new addition to our team! Elizabeth will be helping with our new beginning swimmers. Our talented swimmers make this team great. In 2009 you can look for some new talented faces in different age groups, additions to training techniques and training strategies, and more fun than ever. I will see everyone at sign ups on March 9th. Goooooooooo Seals!
Posted by Coach Ray
at 11:05 PM PST
Updated: Wednesday, February 18, 2009 11:08 PM PST
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