The NZSCTA Board has emailed their members tonight with the news that SNZ have laid off Donna Bouzaid and Gary Hurring. The Chairman of Swimming NZ, Bruce Cotterill, wrote to all the Regional Chairpersons the day after Swimwatch revealed that the Gary and Donna were about to be removed. It is not unreasonable to wonder whether the Swimwatch article had anything to do with Cotterill’s decision to come clean. Without the Swimwatch intervention would SNZ have attempted to hide the news? We will of course never know. But it would not be unusual. They have done worse than that in secret before. In fact, before Cotterill, it was their normal behavior.

However what we do know is the information provided in the NZSCTA email. It is worthwhile looking at the email and discussing its implications.

Swimming NZ, have now advised that they will be transitioning to a new structure. They have yet to communicate what that new structure will be.

Who on God’s good earth is going to design “a new structure”? Not the current Board of Swimming New Zealand I would hope. There are six members of the current Board, There is Bruce Cotterill the Chairman, Geoff Brown the Deputy Chairman and then there are regular members Nick Tongue, Margaret McKee, Anna Tootill and Simon Perry.

None of them have any experience of elite coaching. Only one, Nick Tongue, has any experience of elite swimming. Lesley Huckins is principally a swimming official. But the others are corporate types who did some swimming or waterpolo when they were at school.

I’m not one of those who claim that to run a swimming business you must have a deep and intimate knowledge of all things swimming. The current CEO of Boeing, Dennis Muilenburg, can’t fly an airplane. And that does not affect his ability to manage the company. But what Dennis Muilenburg would never do is design a new aircraft for the company.     

But from the sounds of this email designing SNZ’s new elite performance structure is exactly what Cotterill is about to do. There is no suggestion that he will consult anyone who knows about developing elite swimmers. He might rush off to Peter Miskimmin and Alex Baumann. But we know already that those two are committed to the Millennium Institute and will simply instruct Cotterill to follow the current policy better and with less money. That is not a plan.

Because the truth is – why should we trust the Board of SNZ to design a new structure? Why should we trust Miskimmin and Baumann? They all had a free hand and sat on the Boards that made the decisions that resulted in this mess. And it is not as if they were not told. The pages of this blog pointed out a hundred times that this would be the fate of their decisions. But they never listened. Exactly what was predicted has come to pass. Far from designing a new structure the lot of them should offer their resignation and call in some form of statutory management who do know what they are doing and can design a new structure – Gary and Donna would be a good place to start.

The Board of NZSCTA have met this evening and agreed that the unjustified removal of two of the most important positions that Swimming NZ has is highly detrimental to the development of our sport.

Oh really is that right? I don’t know how many times I’ve been told to back-off when a Swimwatch post predicted this disaster. The problem with the NZSCTA’s shock and horror is it’s too late. The Titanic has hit an iceberg. Water is flooding in. The Board of NZSCTA should have been expressing their concern and pushing for a change of course before we hit the iceberg, before we started to sink.

In 2012 SNZ was in a mess and Miskimmin and company designed a new structure. The Board of NZSCTA voted for the structure that has now directly led to Gary and Donna being sacked. NZSCTA are absolutely complicit in the birth of the problem that has now hurt two good people. Only Auckland and Nelson Marlborough abstained. Five years later we are no better off. In fact we are probably worse off. When the corporation keeps sinking perhaps it is about time NZSCTA admitted its mistakes and asked the SNZ Board to stand down. Perhaps it is time to ask those who have some understanding of elite swimming to get involved.    

The NZSCTA President, Nevill Sutton is meeting by Skype with the Swimming NZ CEO, Steve Johns, next week.

And what is that going to achieve? Nevill is a decent and good person. But the coaches association has not been forceful enough. Time after time they have knuckled under to the direction of SNZ. They have been too nice and now good people are being hurt. Do I believe Nevill will talk truth to power? No of course I don’t. The conversation will be about coming to a consensus, working through the problems and light at the end of the tunnel. Nevill will try and get on. Nevill will try and bring back “peace in our time”.

But that is not what is needed here. Why, for example is Nevill meeting with Steve Johns? This is serious stuff. It is time to meet the Chief Engineer, not the oily rag. Nevill’s meeting should be with Bruce Cotterill. By not being at the meeting Cotterill is saying all we need to know about his view of the NZSCTA.  

The Board wants to acknowledge the huge contribution that both Donna and Gary have made to these roles. Both the Board and the NZSCTA membership would like to offer our unequivocal support to them both during this difficult time.

This is of course true – absolutely true. However, as we have noted above, the recognition and sympathy is all coming way too late. I only hope that the 2017 crisis does not end up in the empty futility of the 2012 version. Because, if it does, in five years there will be another Gary and Donna – not to mention another generation of swimmers that will have also been “disestablished and removed”.

The ball is with the NZSCTA again. Let us hope they do better than the last time they had this chance.   

This post will consider recent feedback received by Swimwatch.

I have heard from three sources that Gary Hurring, Donna Bouzaid and Kent Stead are leaving SNZ – either because they have been pushed or have resigned. Is this true? If it is I am distressed that yet again NZ citizens are being sacrificed in favor of foreigners. If it is true I imagine that lack of money is the motive. Well done SNZ. You have just fired the New Zealander best qualified (Gary) to be national coach. As I say, assuming the leaks are real.

And second I heard from two sources that the case to get Kane Radford into the Olympics had to be paid for by his family. SNZ put $30k aside in their accounts to pay their costs. The case was unnecessary and having lost it so comprehensively SNZ should have paid Kane’s costs. It is what decent people would have done. Assuming Kane’s cost were similar to those of SNZ, $30,000 is a huge amount of money for a family to find to get their son onto a New Zealand team. The Radford’s did not deserve that

But the most important feedback I got this week was in response to the post suggesting an alternative SNZ high performance policy. The reply was well thought out, intelligent and a sincere effort to suggest changes that would benefit swimming in New Zealand. I want to consider these ideas both where they contradict and where they support the policy proposed in my earlier post. The correspondent’s comments are shown in italics and my replies follow.

In high performance, sports’ federations need to focus on athletes who have the potential to win medals in 2020. Swimming NZ does not do this. Start focusing more on younger swimmers not just the Lauren Boyles, Matt Stanleys and Glenn Snyders of swimming.

This comment is both very right and very wrong. First – where I disagree. It is not SNZ’s job to pick winners – no matter how old, or young, they are. That responsibility lies with the swimmer’s coach and family. Winners can emerge from anywhere at any age. Snell came from Opunaki, Halberg from Eketahuna, Loader from Dunedin and Davies from Tokoroa. Toni Jeffs did not start full time training until she was 18. Responsibility for identifying champions needs to be devolved down to the home coaches responsible for the swimmer’s progress and not vested in a sporting version of the granny state.   

And second – where I agree. SNZ should be supporting every coaching program in the country and every good swimmer irrespective of age. And SNZ does not do that. They are too busy running around trying to make the Millennium Institute work to develop the national infrastructure that would produce Olympic champions. Goodness knows how many Snells, Halbergs, Loaders and Davies swimming has lost in the past twenty years because SNZ decided to do everything on the North Shore rather than focus on and improve coaching programs everywhere.  

Canada (and Australia) have regional High Performance centres. Soon there will be nearly as many swimmers from NZ there than in its own High Performance Centre. 

If you think about it the policy proposed last week in Swimwatch is effectively promoting the idea of Regional High Performance Centres. There is no reason why Waterhole, United, North Shore, HPK and others can’t be high performance centres in Auckland and Tawa, Capital, Karori and others in Wellington and Aquahawks, Heretanga and others in Hawke Bay. Every coaching program that complies with SNZ coaching standards needs to be treated by SNZ as a high performance centre.    

Initiatives to foster performance should start at Junior (U18) level – Aussie Age Grades, then World Juniors/Jnr Pan Pacs. SNZ currently has no involvement in this at the moment apart from naming the teams and coaches.

Here there is philosophical disagreement. It is not SNZ’s job to foster the performance of any swimmer of any age. Swimming is not a “granny” state run business. Responsibility for fostering a swimmer’s performance belongs to the swimmer and the swimmer’s coaching program and the swimmer’s family. SNZ’s job is to set coaching standards and then monitor and support whatever plan the swimmer’s team believes is best whether that’s World Juniors or the HBPB Summer Champs in Gisborne.    

Aussie state champs – NSW for seniors and Queensland for age graders not near Olympic B times should be utilised.  Currently swimmers go of their own accord. But there is no coordinated strategy between regions that send these teams

This view could very well be right. I enjoy the NSW Open meet and the Queensland Age Group meet. However here again it is not for SNZ or me to tell swimmers where they should swim. If Gary Martin in Gisborne thinks the South Australian Championship in Adelaide is a better event for his swimmers then that’s where they should be. As Arthur Lydiard put it to me, “Trust your coaches.”

There are no swimming standards in NZ apart from FINA A and B times and FINA points for national and development teams. Swimming NZ should have “on-track” times like Swimming Canada does. If swimmers cannot get within 4% of their PB in their best events (up to 400m events) don’t sent them to overseas competitions until they can.

Although the correspondent’s view is close to mine I would expand the “on-track” times thought. SNZ should set a number of content, distance and time standards for local coaching programs and then have a comprehensive monitoring/reporting procedure for evaluating compliance and progress. “On-track” times would be an important part of the reporting and support process.  

I think minimum weekly training distances are being exceed by coaches in NZ – some who are overtraining their swimmers

Very few coaches are overtraining swimmers in terms of distance. Distance on its own never hurt anyone. Phelps is reported to have been swimming 80 kilometres a week at 13. What is overtraining and does hurt swimmers is the balance and type of training being swum. A bad coach can kill a swimmer with speed work sprints whether the distance is 18 or 80 kilometres a week. Overtraining is almost always a product of the type of training, not the distance.

Ensure swimmers peak at pinnacle events, not at their trials.

This is a view that supports the appointment of a National Head Coach with responsibility for coaching coaches. Failure to peak at a planned event is almost always the result of a coaching error. The coach has mistimed the swimmer’s preparation. The new National Head Coach position recommended in the previous Swimwatch post will have the effect of reducing the number of these training errors.       

The correspondent concludes his email with four points regarding the scheduling of swim meets. I currently have very little understanding of New Zealand meet schedules and therefore will not comment apart from reprinting below the changes the correspondent would like to see.   

The meet programme is too random. No point having a top regional meet on the same weekend as Div2. Don’t have NAGs a week before Opens. Have at least one long course open meet in both the first half and the second half of each year.

Ensure each main swimming region has an all-day meet at least three times a year

Ensure NZ Opens is not on the same time as Australian Age Grades/Opens or state champs.

Make zonal competition 15U and 16O – not 13-15 and 16+

I have heard it said that Swimwatch is strong on criticism but never offers a solution. That is not true. Many Swimwatch articles have described an alternative policy to the failed strategy being followed by SNZ. Doing justice to a national swimming policy in a thousand words is not easy; probably impossible. However this post is another attempt to describe a New Zealand alternative to the Miskimmin plan that, for 20 years, has failed to produce an Olympic medal. It is a policy prepared and followed by Arthur Lydiard in Finland and copied in most of the world’s best swimming countries – especially the United States.

I can recall very clearly sitting in Lydiard’s Beachland’s home discussing centralized coaching. Arthur was adamant that elite coaching consolidated onto one site would not produce the best Olympic results. He explained why and how he had followed an alternative policy. I am confident this report encapsulates his views and would receive his support.   

• Introduction

This Review will consider swimming in NZ in two ways.

First, the Review will consider the current policy and discuss why it has not resulted in competitive success. The Review will make two recommendations for the future.

Second, the Review will discuss possible future policy initiatives aimed at improving the sports’ competitive results. The Review will make four recommendations for the future.

• Principles on which the policy is based

In order for a corporate policy to be effective it is beneficial for the policy to be based on a set of known and stable principles.

I believe there are several principles that would benefit SNZ’s competitive program.

1. SNZ should move away from imported foreigners brought in on short term contracts to coach high performance swimmers. And where foreign expertise is necessary a requirement must be that the foreign import leaves behind NZ residents capable of continuing their work at the same level.
2. SNZ should focus on controlling and directing an environment conducive to superior performance. SNZ is best placed to create, control and improve the environment in which private independent contractors operate. SNZ should not attempt to be a contractor. For example SNZ controls the High Performance Centre in Auckland. All the best swimming nations have Federations who legislate and promote elite performance by independent operators and stay out of direct contracting.
3. SNZ should ensure all parties involved understand SNZ’s standards as they apply to safety, quality, performance, discipline, rewards and the host of other features characteristic of a well-run swimming business. Detailed and accurate communication is essential.
4. SNZ should promote a coach driven environment. The world’s most successful swimming nations recognise that world class swimmers are identified, nurtured and maintained by coach led programs and publically identify and endorse the importance of coaches accordingly.

• Current Policy

1. SNZ should abandon the policy of running its own High Performance swim program at the Millennium Institute. SNZ does best promoting and policing swimming programs managed and run by outside private contractors rather than getting involved in managing and running a “state-run” swim school. It is hard to reconcile the perceived conflict of interest that inevitably arises when SNZ tries to be both the governor and the worker. Often I have heard or read comment that the SNZ Millennium swim school is “better” than the independent swim schools. I have also heard independent swim school owners say that it is not fair that SNZ should be competing with independent operators for swimming business – especially when SNZ is so heavily subsidised by the taxpayer. For SNZ to be both a controller and an operator is a recipe for conflict. SNZ would be best to focus on governing the business. Directly running swim schools is not part of the governing role.
2. The current policy of promoting competitive standards by bringing foreign coaches to the NZ to prepare swimmers for international events is never going to work. In fact it has only damaged the confidence and status of domestic coaches and has aggravated the fundamental problems that continue to hurt the performance of NZ swimming. The current policy has undermined and weakened the national coaching infrastructure.  

For the past fifteen years eight foreign coaches from the USA, Germany, the UK and Australia have been used to prepare SNZ teams. In addition some NZ swimmers have been sent to foreign training camps in Europe and the United States. In every case a foreign coach has been brought in, has been paid well and has left and nothing has changed – life goes on as though the foreigner had never been here. Structural change is needed.

Improving the performance of NZ swimmers is a task New Zealand domestic coaches must solve. New Zealand’s best swimmers have all come from domestic programs or American University teams.

And so this policy of an imported coach coaching selected swimmers in the Millennium Institute has not worked and will never work. It is expensive, especially when the funding of swimming has been so seriously reduced.

The table below summarises what I would recommend in relation to the current two policies followed by SNZ.

CURRENT POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS

• Proposed future policy

There are four initiatives that will benefit NZ’s future competitive performance. Pursue these recommendations and I am confident NZ can achieve the competitive results shown in the table below.

PREDICTED FOUR YEAR COMPETITIVE RESULTS

Recommendation One – Appoint a National Head Coach with a new role

NZ swimming would benefit from the appointment of a National Head Coach who coaches NZ’s domestic coaches. In other words the role of a National Head Coach would not be to coach swimmers – none at all – but to teach NZ coaches the changes needed to produce world class results.

It is important to understanding what the role of a national Head Coach should be.

A National Head Coach should travel the length and breadth of NZ constantly, finding out what domestic coaches need and stressing the view that in order for NZ to win international swimming events swimmers must be provided with world class properly balanced training. What that means is that the National Head Coach should ensure that coaches from Invercargill to Kaitaia have knowledge of and access to all the information and services in the pool and outside the pool required to produce champion swimmers.   

The reason many NZ swimmers have never swum faster is that for years their training has failed to equip them with the necessary fitness. Their training preparation could be better balanced. The swimmers are technically sound but as long as they graduate from learn to swim into poorly balanced training and conditioning programs they still will not win.

For example in the pool a domestic coach’s job is to provide aerobic, anaerobic and speed training in the correct proportions. And the correct proportions are pretty well known and followed by 99% of the world’s good coaches. Whether the proportions are supplied in monthly periods or weekly or daily periods the proportions are the same. Around the world good coaches supply training in the following proportions.

That’s the gold standard. Successful coaches provide fast swimmers with a 40/20/40 balanced program.

That is an example of the swimming education challenge faced by a new National Head Coach and NZ competitive swimming. Improve that and the country can win medals in international events easily. Continue providing primarily anaerobic and speed training and the swimmers physiologically simply will never swim fast – they can’t.

By using a combination of penalties and rewards a new National Head Coach whose job is to coach coaches needs to address the problem of insufficient aerobic input by about ten times, too much anaerobic input by about double and 20% too much speed training.

A Head Coach needs to educate and help NZ domestic coaches in all training related matters.

Recommendation Two – Change the amount of work

The amount of training being provided by NZ coaches needs to change. The changes should be enforced by using a combination of penalties and rewards.

The principal penalty available to SNZ is to deny selection to swimmers and coaches who do not comply with SNZ coaching standards. Initially this may cause some pain. Coaches and swimmers are used to being selected irrespective of their training performance. That should stop. The reasons and long term benefit of the required changes need to be fully explained. But once that is done the standards should be enforced irrespective of status, reputation or dissent.

The principal reward available to SNZ is to select swimmers to national teams. By complying with new SNZ training standards and achieving published qualifying times swimmers will be selected for national teams. That is their reward Training and performance are rewarded by selection. Financial rewards should only be part of published, open and outstanding performance. And when financial rewards are earned they should be paid equally to the swimmer and their coach.

And so what new SNZ training standard should be introduced?

The amount of training needs to be increased if NZ swimmers are going to achieve international swimming success. Several years ago the well-known Australian coach, Bill Sweetenham, became the United Kingdom Head Coach. He faced the same “amount-of-training” problem. He solved it by publishing a minimum distance all swimmers wanting to be selected for UK teams had to swim in training. For senior swimmers Sweetenham’s distance was 50 kilometres per week. And it worked. UK swimming is now very successful. In the Rio Olympic Games UK swimmers competed in 20 finals and won five silver medals and one gold medal.  

The table below sets out the minimum distance standards I would recommend SNZ adopt for swimmers wanting to be selected on NZ national teams. Clearly a new National Head Coach is going to have to introduce a comprehensive national reporting procedure in order to control and monitor the new training standards.

Recommendation Three – More Competition     

NZ swimmers do not compete in enough international competitive events. No one can win international events if they never go to international events. It sounds ridiculous but that is what SNZ has been trying to do in recent years. Winning requires exposure to the environment and lots of it.

It is pretty well accepted that good swimmers should compete in about 100 races per year. So what needs to be done to address this problem? Here are some proposals:.

1. Make more use of World Cup events in Europe, the Middle East and Asia.
2. Continue to use national and state events in Australia
3. Make more use of the Mare Nostrum Series of three events in Barcelona, Canet and Monaco
4. Make more use of major USA domestic meets such as the Ft Lauderdale International and the Janet Evans Meet.

That is the sort of racing program necessary to achieve international swimming success.

All these events are run by non SNZ organisations. They simply involve SNZ selecting the swimmers and deciding on entries, travel, accommodation and financial arrangements.

Recommendation Six – A coach driven environment  

Every national Federation has to develop an environment in which the country’s coaches work. Some like the United States and Australia have worked hard to create a coach friendly, coach driven environment. Others have created an environment where coaches “need to be kept under control” where “coaches are too big for their boots” where there is an administrator driven environment.

The results are very clear. The coach driven environment works and is successful. The negative environment towards coaches does not work. Those Federations fail to perform.

In NZ we need to address the question of the respect and recognition given to NZ coaches and work to genuinely produce a coach driven environment. In my first book on swimming, “Swim to the Top”, I described the role of the coach as follows:    

It lies, I think, partly in the training of the coach, partly in the definition of the coach’s role. The “old pro” could teach only by repetition of his own skills as a practitioner and by requiring imitation. The new coach is a person trained not only as an expert in the skills and knowledge of the event, but in the skills of communicating that knowledge. This is an academic training, and gives to coaching the academic responsibilities of mastering a discipline and an area of knowledge, and of fostering these and passing them on.

So a coach is someone with whom you travel, who is a means of conveying the student or athlete along a rough road to a difficult destination. If we think of coaching as a means of travel, we may perceive more clearly both the importance and the limits of the coach’s role. The coach has indispensable functions: to instruct, to motivate and to inculcate strategy, especially that long-term strategy which no young competitor can know by instinct. The coach should also observe clearly defined limits: not to intrude into the ultimate aloneness of the competitor nor to diminish the essentially individual satisfaction of sporting achievement. The coach’s achievement and satisfaction are equally real, equally valid, but different. The means of travel is not the traveller.”

NZ has the basics right. There is a good coaches’ organization, an informative coaching newsletter, an interesting annual conference and the like. However that structure could work better. The coaches’ organisation needs to play a far more important and assertive role. For example, recently a major fee was introduced charging coaches to attend the Open Swimming Championships without consulting the coaches. That should never happen.

And SNZ need to encourage the added prominence given to all NZ coaches. NZ should initiate a program of tuition explaining to the Swim Coaches Association the greater scope and importance of the new role of all coaches in the nation’s sport.

And with respect and recognition comes responsibility. NZ coaches must be made acutely aware that with their new and more important role comes a far higher level of responsibility to generate winning performances.

While these recommendations might have the appearance of SNZ relinquishing authority to NZ coaches, the trust shown in such initiatives will be rewarded many times over by improved performance.

FUTURE POLICY RECOMENDATIONS

• Conclusion

The recommendations that have been made in this Review are honestly held views on how a national swimming program should be coached. I hope they do not sound pompous or self-important. That was never the intention. I can understand the NZ sporting authority’s disappointment in the sport of swimming’s competitive results. They could be improved. I believe the recommendations made in this Review would generate that improvement and would result in the forecast competitive results included in this Review.