The "Boring" Path to Being Great

What makes a fast swimmer fast?

In my life I’ve had a lot of opportunities to interact with fast swimmers. I’ve swum with a few, coached a few, and even got married by one; so, I’ve had a lot of opportunities to try to answer that question. And there is only one thing that’s serves as a throughline to connect these great swimmers is that they do the little things better than anyone else in the pool.

But is my anecdotal experience enough to make a generalized statement that can be applied to swimmers everywhere?

Probably not. Luckily we don’t have to just trust me.

One of the most influential things I’ve ever read is the Mundanity of Excellence by Daniel Chambliss.

Chambliss, a professor of sociology at Hamilton College in Clinton, New York, set out to examine what allowed Olympic swimmers to reach that level and why other swimmers never did. Ultimately his findings were relatively boring: excellence is the result of little things done correctly over and over and over again until excellence in those details becomes a firmly ingrained habit. There’s no “talent,” physical characteristic, or motivational speech on day 365 that can overcome doing things poorly over the prior 364 days. If you want to be excellent, you have to make the choice to do things correctly every single time.

And there’s nothing exciting about that. Not the way our favorite song pumped directly through our Air Pods into our brains or in a fiery pregame speech from our coach is exciting.

After all, we’ve all seen Miracle, or at least watched the YouTube clips of Kurt Russell as Herb Brooks firing up Team USA to take on the Russians in the semi finals at the Olympics. But the miracle result wouldn’t have happened if the team relied on Brooks’ inspiration and chose to practice lackadaisically and without focus. Instead because of Brooks’ influence and the team’s personality and choice they practiced intensely and perfected their skills in the lead up to the 1980 Olympics. The speech is great. I love it. And while the movie, in brilliant Hollywood fashion, ties the result to Brooks’ powers of inspiration. But the game was won in the work.

Excellence comes from little things, done well consistently, over an extended period of time. And if you’re going to be excellent, you have to make the choice to do those little things well every time you take a stroke, do a turn, push off the wall in streamline, or start from the blocks or side of the pool. When I challenge my swimmers to take this approach to their swimming, to do things right every opportunity of every single day, I tell them it won’t be easy, and it won’t always be fun. But it will be worth it.