the Michael Phelps effect

we knew it would be large numbers...but how large, we wouldn't know until our first day back at the pool.

saturday was our open house for the swim team. as minnesota's largest and most accomplished swim team, we were expecting large numbers. from 1-2:45 i took kid after kid, some scared, some overly excited, as they showed me their skills in the pool. do you know freestyle? backstroke? breaststroke? butterfly? some nod their heads, some gave me blank stares. then into the pool as they swam and i evaluated, kids running everywhere as us 9 coaches tried to find enough room for our new swimmer to swim. then i would place them in a group and send them back to mom and dad for registration.

there were a lot of kids, and we were done before 3 pm, which was our cut off time.

yesterday, my group had 42 of the 48 kids registered show up. our roster is 2 pages, compared to the 1 page and 20 names it usually is. good thing i had a co-coach.

now, i'm not too worried. the way i coach this season will have to change a little bit and with all the kids and the wider range of abilities, i unfortunatly won't be able to cater to the individuality of the kids as much as i used to. heck, i'm worried about learning all of their names! co-coach was freaking out a little more than i think she needed to, but i guess that's expected. she's also worried about getting time away from the pool, which i just committed myself to 5 days a week plus weekend meets. it'll keep me busy and hopefully in shape, too.

but i guess this is what happens after you have someone go and win 8 golds in your sport. i love that just by him doing that, our numbers pretty much more than doubled for the season. i'm really curious, however, to see how many actually stick around. i'll give you an update in 2 weeks when the free trial period is over for these swimmers :)