Day in the Life of a Collegiate Swimmer?

<p>Hi all,</p>

<p>I was curious as to what the average day consists of for a collegiate swimmer. I’m looking to swim DI, but any and all insight about the athlete’s schedule at any level would be appreciated. Thanks.</p>

<p>CMart98;</p>

<p>First of all, all D1 programs are not alike. Some require a lot more, others require less, but I’ll give you an average day. Note that there are NCAA requirements on the maximum amount of practice hours per week, but that there are numerous ways around those requirements by making activities optional (but you have to attend.)</p>

<p>5:15am Wake up Mon-Sat
5:30am to 7:30am Practice Mon-Sat
7:30am Breakfast
8am to 2pm Classes
3pm to 5pm Practice Mon-Fri
5:30pm Dinner in athletic dining facility
6:30pm-10pm Study in athletic study hall to meet mandatory study requirements for athletes
10pm Lights out</p>

<p>Other things to work into the week:
Weights, dryland, team meetings, physicals, random drug tests, tutor if needed due to missed classes from travel meets, team community service, and hosting recruits.</p>

<p>Challenges to success:

  1. Scheduling lab based science classes is hard, most labs are 3 hours long and take a big chunk out of your day
  2. Scheduling classes you need at times you can actually get them—sometimes this leads to taking a night class or a summer class
  3. Missed classes due to travel meets–most travel meets you will travel the day before the meet…and conference championships almost always require 3-5 days of missed classes</p>

<p>During the season you will not go home for mid-Fall break, or most of Christmas break. Our current D1 swimmer had 6 nights away from school at Thanksgiving, and 5 at Christmas, and otherwise has been training at school during break or attends a week long training trip to another location.</p>

<p>Some D1 programs require a year round commitment–with 50 weeks a year of training, including Spring post conference championships and Summer. Others do not. Year round training at college makes internships and jobs difficult to undertake. </p>

<p>Most D1 swimmers will not go professional after college. They need jobs. Therefore, its a constant and delicate balance between the academics and athletic commitments.</p>

<p>Good luck in your recruiting process.</p>

<p>Very helpful post, swim4school. </p>

<p>My daughter is a Div 1 athlete, and this schedule is pretty dead on accurate for her experiences, thus far. Every sport has additional demands on time that vary throughout year. </p>

<p>Also, I now schedule her flights home on Southwest, because coach likes to change schedule of when they have to return to school after breaks. At least no change fees. </p>

<p>The work life balance is difficult. Time management is critical.</p>

<p>The best way to know what the schedule is like at the schools you are looking at is by talking to the coach or by asking people on the team.</p>

<p>Older teammates are a good resource. :)</p>

<p>My D’s coach wasn’t always good about imparting this info.</p>

<p>Coaches cannot really tell the recruits what the requirements are or they may appear to be in violation of NCAA requirements limiting the amount of time an athlete is involved in the sport. Current older swimmers are a good resource. I always recommend that recruits ask the freshmen and the sophomores about time commitments. Freshmen tell a fairly accurate version of the truth but are still shell shocked at the demands of the team. Sophomores tell the exact truth–lived it once, living it again. Upperclassmen have become “used” to the demands, so I feel that though they give accurate answers, they often are more blase about it–they have figured it out. </p>

<p>Bottom line–if you want to be a Division 1 swimmer–the team owns you. They make the decisions on when you can schedule your classes based on working around your practice obligations, they make the decisions on when you can go home on holidays, and when you’ll attend classes based on travel demands. You have to decide if that’s worth it to swim D1. There are very few D1 swimmers that do not, at some point in their freshman year, question whether or not they can hack it–and whether they want to do so long term.</p>

<p>My daughter rooms with a swimmer. That young lady is on a training trip now, and missed half of her two week holiday semester break. </p>

<p>Training comes at inconvenient times, and she will go back to school earlier in summer, too. </p>

<p>Vacations are tough - certain majors may need internships, or additional summer classes too hard to take during school year because of rest if classes plus training and travel. My D took one of her required classes for major that she could take during summer break at a community college while balancing demands of internship she needed for major. Hard to work a summer job that paid, so couldn’t. Hopefully this summer. </p>

<p>Being a Div 1 athlete also means that you may doing all this on regular financial aid or parents paying. Not everyone gets a full ride. In fact, few do. It all depends in sport. </p>

<p>D’s roommate on a 50% scholarship. </p>

<p>Also study abroad options are limited. You might be able to do one, a short one in summer. Depends on coaches demands.</p>

<p>Very good advice here. If my D had known just how much her D1 sport would control her life outside of the expected practices/games, we do believe she would have more seriously considered D3 schools. Her D3 friends have a much better balance between school/sport/social. Sigh…</p>

<p>My son swims for a D3 Liberal Arts College in the NESCAC Conference. The day in the life is very similar to D1 during season, except meets are on Saturdays so they generally don’t miss class. In addition, at least for this conference, official practices don’t begin until November 1. Swimmers are expected to practice before that but coaches aren’t allowed on deck and can’t enforce anything. When the season is over, again, they are expected to stay in shape but the coach can’t enforce anything. D3 swimming takes a lot away during season as is described above but then they have a break from doubles etc. Check out the times and rankings for top D3 schools on the NCAA website. Certain D3 schools give merit aid for what the student can contribute to the college. And if your student is an academically talented student, then you can use the swimming to help with admission to a top school. Lots of ways to leverage their talents!</p>

<p>Swim4school description of an average day is not typical for most D1 swim programs. By my count Swim4school team has 22 hours of required practice per week which is out of compliance with the NCAA mandated maximum of 20 hours per week in season. Other programs have practice on Saturday morning with one afternoon off a week which allows labs to be scheduled. In addition study hall for freshman is usually required however most programs require 6 hours a week or less. Mandatory weights, dryland, and team meetings count against the maximum weekly 20 hours. Also note that not all freshman will make the travel and conference championship teams.</p>

<p>In order to reach the D1 level most high school swimmers practice at least 20 hours a week year round. Most high school swimmers at that level also attend Jr Nationals, regional LSC championships, state high school championships and have one or more team travels meets so they are used to missing a certain amount of school. </p>

<p>The biggest difference between high school and college swimming is the intensity required during practice. College coaches use more resistance training, underwater pace clocks, and more practice groups. Your practice group will be faster than in high school so interval times for a given distance will usually be significantly less.</p>

<p>My son swims D1. He is also a biochem major and had no problem scheduling around labs. His team has 1 or two practices a day and weight training on the days that there is only one practice. The great thing about swimming as opposed to most other sports is the flexibility of practices. If practice and an afternoon lab conflict, hi coac lets him swim in the morning. I totally disagree that the team “owns” him. Quite the contrary. It is part of his college community. He also plays the double base in a school orchestra. </p>

<p>I agree that all teams are different. An official visit is a must. That I the time to ask other swimmers what the real deal is for that team.</p>

<p>Agree with the comments that when ‘push comes to shove’ all of us in the family wanted a coach that supports academics first and the swimmer’s success outside the pool as well as in. That includes study abroad as a mandatory part of the major and understanding that some make-up practices are necessary to accommodate labs, studio, exams, etc. We were lucky enough to find a coach with similar priorities - improving on times coming in a close second for him though! My kid knows it is going to be very tough, but is so excited to be able to swim D-1 at her top choice school - an opportunity enjoyed by few of her current teammates. She’ll decide whether it is worth hanging in with the swimming after the first year I’m sure, but what an opportunity for these athletes!</p>

<p>This info is very helpful since my S15 is just starting the recruiting process. He is used to practicing 9 times a week which is about 22 hours a week so the time practicing will be about the same. And then high school kids are actually in classes longer than college kids but understand the hours studying iare significantly more. I must say that I welcome the mandatory study tables for my son.</p>

<p>CMart98, D1 swimming (from what I have learnt) takes many forms. You have D1 programs that:</p>

<ol>
<li> Take large teams to the NCAAs</li>
<li> Take 1-4 swimmers to NCAAs</li>
<li> Do not go to NCAAs because no one has qualified</li>
</ol>

<p>The schedule that Swim4School has kindly outlined will most likely apply to the D1 schools in ‘1’ above. I suppose, you just need to work out what you want, and where you will find the best fit. It also seems to me that the schools that offer money (scholarships) tend to get their swimmers to the NCAAs (not all D1 schools offer money), and so may be the ones that want to “own” you. There is no hard and fast rule here, but the fully funded programs need to justify what they are paying out.</p>

<p>As many experienced parents and others have said elsewhere on this site, it is a good thing to ask yourself ‘do I have the potential to make an Olympics final’? If ‘yes’, then the next question should probably be ‘is following this dream more important to me now, than my academics’? If ‘yes’, then there are probably less than 10 schools that can deliver - all things being equal. All of these will “own” you, and rightly so.</p>

<p>The beauty of NCAA swimming (it seems to me, at least) is that there is something for nearly every good competitive swimmer.</p>

<p>For the swimmer who wishes to pursue his or her Olympic dreams, I say go for it and good luck. For the swimmer who wants their swimming to open academic and job doors, likewise, I say go for it and good luck. There is no right or wrong answer, just what is right or wrong for YOU.</p>

<p>Some people say you can achieve both. My research indicates that maybe you could - at one school c. 9 years ago, but I don’t think you can now. There is one school that always comes to mind as offering the best of both, but they don’t seem to be able to develop LCM swimmers, and top yards swimmers who have gone there have not moved forward much with their swimming (track the progress of the high school stars of yesteryears as an indication of what each school can do - maybe look at 2-3/school to be fair). </p>

<p>Be honest with yourself, do your research and good luck:)</p>

<p>The program outlined by Swim4school did not go to the NCAA last year.</p>

<p>In 2012 the majority of the women US Olympic medalists were not in college. One notable exception was Elizabeth Beisel who won a silver and bronze medal while she was swimming for Florida. During that same time she was named Capital One Academic All-America of the Year. There are several universities that have world class academics and have helped train many Olympic medalists. The list would include Cal and Michigan. I personally know of several swimmers who have a near 4.0 in a STEM major who swim for teams that send many swimmers every year to the NCAA.</p>