Earlier this week Swimming New Zealand (SNZ) published its newsletter. There were articles on the 2018 youth Olympic Games team, vital water safety skills lagging in primary school children, becoming a qualified swim teacher and a recap of the 2018 Pan Pacific Championships. I’m sure that, like me, you will have noticed the omission from that list. Of course, it is obvious. So I rang Steve Johns and Bruce Cotterill and asked if I could correct SNZ’s error and publish a follow up Freestyle Newsletter devoted exclusively to announcing SNZ’s most exciting news. Johns and Cotterill seemed more than happy to accept my offer. In fact they volunteered the services of the SNZ Media Department to draft and post this bulletin.

SNZ is delighted to announce the arrival in New Zealand of a magnificent new swimming book. Titled “Shaping Successful Junior Swimmers”, the book is written by an old friend of SNZ, David Wright. A copy of the book already graces the SNZ Antares Place bookshelf. You may be asking, how did SNZ jump the queue and get their hands on this prized purchase.

Well, SNZ are smart, that’s how they did it. First, they opened Google and typed the name of the book, “Shaping Successful Junior Swimmers”, into the search engine. Immediately a dozen contacts flashed across the screen. Oh my God, this book is already a best seller. SNZ could buy the book from Platekompaniet in Sweden for 229 Kroner, or from Love Reading in the UK, or from Amazon.com in the USA, the UK, Australia and New Zealand. It was even available from Whitcoulls in New Zealand. The best deal was through Amazon New Zealand. For just $A19.95, including postage, this treasure could be theirs. But SNZ decided to support New Zealand and got their copy from venerable Whitcoulls, slightly more expensive but, what the heck, SNZ was paying.

Not only is the book for sale around the world, Google provides a preview of the book’s first forty pages. I’m told it took SNZ no time at all to read and digest every word. Then they knew this was a book SNZ just had to have. A quick swipe of their SNZ credit card and the book was on its way. NZ Post would deliver it to their Antares Place door.

The next day was a bit of a riot as SNZ staff mobbed the NZ Post delivery van to catch a glimpse of the new literary jewel. Eventually Johns got the book inside and safely into the main office bookcase. A memorandum was posted on the office noticeboard listing the names, in priority order, of the staff allowed to read the new purchase.

Word quickly spread. SNZ fielded calls and accepted interviews from the NZ Herald, Radio Sport and both television channels. Even Dave Crampton called asking for an interview. He said he wanted to write a review for his ultra-secret, security clearance required Facebook page. Could SNZ send him their copy? Johns declined Crampton’s request. There was no way “Shaping Successful Junior Swimmers” was being sent to Wellington. This book needed to be reviewed by someone who knew something about the sport. Crampton would have to get a copy for himself.

And that’s how SNZ got this new insight into New Zealand swimming. You must know the satisfaction of a job well done; the contentment that comes from successfully completing a difficult task. Well that’s the way SNZ feel today. SNZ has in its bookcase an item of New Zealand swimming history; “Shaping Successful Junior Swimmers” from Whitcoulls or for just $A19.95 from New Zealand and Australia Amazon.com.

Of course I’m being flippant. I have no expectation that SNZ or Dave Crampton will ever have an interest in reading “Shaping Successful Junior Swimmers”. I’m not sure why not. The book addresses a serious subject that should be of concern to the national federation. A teenage dropout rate from the sport of 80% is clear evidence of something wrong. For years waterpolo and surf clubs have survived on the fallout from competitive swimming. Good heavens, the SNZ CEO, Steve Johns, is a discarded product of the same waste. He, above all others, should be interested in why his pool career failed to progress and what could have been done better.

In addition, it is not every day that a book, based primarily on New Zealand swimming, is published widely around the world and achieves most of its sales in the United States and Europe. That must make it of some interest. Swimming New Zealand should get a copy. They will certainly recognise themselves in much that it says. The book contains many New Zealand examples of the problems that end up causing an 80% dropout rate. The solutions proposed may also lead to better Board decisions. We will see.

For any readers interested in the book, the table below shows the links to some websites selling “Shaping Successful Junior Swimmers”. I do hope you enjoy it, and the opinions expressed make swimming in New Zealand just that little bit better.