Excuses are no solutions

Kazan

I have been to many championships, but Kazan was really one of the best organized championships. It was just awesome. Very short ways, both pools were in one stadium, and for the swimmers it was just perfectly organised logistics. The organization was flawless, driving back and forth was really smooth, reliably on time. I thought it was one of the best events in sports overall, not only for swimming.

And Sochi was also pretty well organized with a lot of staff, very friendly people, many volunteers. If there was a question there were always more than one who could take care of me, and even walk me  to the other side of the stadium if i needed to.  The quality of help and service was unparalleled.

Overall of the championships I think that the atmosphere was really great with the audience and people that were there. For the races especially when Russian swimmers were in water the moment, and the energy was so tense and charged, it was really very special.

New countries at the world championships

In these championships so many new countries participated. On the one hand it was good, but on the other hand I think it would be better to have a qualifying round. Of course, this is more related to FINA than to Russia. You know, like in tennis, you go to US Open or Australian Open and you first have a qualify. Before the real action starts you have a one week or so to have all these new countries compete, the best of them to qualify and some to get a wild card for the main round.

I'm also coaching in a small club in Germany with kids between 9 and 19 years old. And I have 9 year olds that swim faster than some of the swimmers, who competed in Kazan.

It is important to make a political statement and push the swimming sport in those countries. And we still have a lot of work ahead. Yet, putting them directly into the main field is not of much help for the sport in those countries. I think that we can definitely copy some strategies from tennis and apply them to swimming. Qualification is a much better way to promote the sport.

The advantage of a week of qualifying rounds offers the advantage, that we could also implement workshops for the coaches of the new countries, about coaching skills and knowledge. We are lucky to live in countries with ample opportunities to train well. We forget that most of them don't even have a normal pool and swim in a small pool of 10 or less meters length. We could make great sociological contributions by moving closer. And we should not forget, that the industrialisation has also created a sociological imbalance which directly effects the sports development in third world countries. I think these new countries and weak swimmers deserve a more sustainable experience, not only a once in a lifetime experience.

Yuliya the Gladiator

World championships are just like the big arena in a Colloseum in Rome two thousand years ago. People just love to witness fights. The energy that I grasped when I was down there below the stadium with Andrej Efimov waiting for Yuliya to change into her race suite, was an extreme experience: it was very quiet. In the distance you could hear the mass of people screaming. The air was charged with energy, nothing can describe the atmosphere down there. Not many words, calm, yet still very focused, very tense. And out there was the show. People were waiting for the gladiators to get out and fight.

From my standpoint I’m absolutely satisfied with Yuliya's performance in Kazan. It was nearly two years of being outside of competitions. It was her first big competition in her home country. Of course it did not go the way she probably wished with 200 meters and 50 meters. But it was a very strong race. If you just train and you don't compete, an essential part of preparation is missing.

These world class athletes are working hard over a long time, putting many hours into their job, and the closer they get to the peak which is the world championships or the Olympic games the less you can do to influence the result.

Being prepared means relying less on luck. Many people say "I need a little bit of luck". But I think that you are either prepared and everything around you is also prepared or you are not prepared. Just an overall example: prepare your travel by calculating 2-3 days extra to compensate possible flight delays, spending an extra night or two at your destination will make stressed situations less possible and will allow you to implement team building games to make your team a strong unit. Preparation means, minimizing situations which you cannot influence.

But excuses are no solutions and finding solutions is a good preparation.

Team building

And I had the impression that the Russian team still has some potential left undiscovered in the field of team building. Swimming is an individual sport, yet, observing some of the other teams, they act as a team even outside the arena.There's also a lot you can do to make a team become strong as one unit and for each athlete to be pushed forward by the rest of the team.

Journalists and Ruta

We always have to look at the nature of our jobs, and of all the people involved in a situation. To ask questions is a journalists' job. How does a journalist earn his money to make a living? Journalists need to create attention and good ones exactly know what the mass of the people out there wants to  read and hear about. The mass of the people is generally very keen on spectacular news of crashes, killings, catastrophes or fights.

Good journalists know exactly which buttons to turn and to push to attract attention and to create a mass movement.Now, if we take Ruta as an example of a great young athlete… By the nature of her job, she is very competitive.

And we are not talking about some athlete - we are talking about an athlete that is fighting to be a number one in a world. She is in the top-3. Her job is to be fast and not only fast, but faster than all the others. Of course that is something not only in a water. So if the journalists push these buttons, I don't think that Ruta is to blame for making the statement against Yuliya.

It's just an expression of her competitive and combat nature that all the athletes have. Look at boxers. When boxers meet in the press conference they already have a fight. Verbally. So I think it's a part of the game and part of the show that people want. That's why I do not have a bad impression of Ruta. She is a very respectable young woman, who worked very hard to get where she is.

It takes a lot of experience in life and a lot of experience in your personal nature to read the journalist before he reads you and to understand that the journalist is actually just doing his job.

If we understand these rules by which we all act, then I think everything is fine. Everyone is fulfilling their jobs - journalists, coaches, athletes, spectators, etc. The swimmers are very competitive people, and if you are not in a water I still will try to beat you just with words.