Dear Swim Therapy we just wanted to say how much the children enjoyed their training with you this week. Although the sets were tough at the start of each session the children knew they were fair and enjoyed being pushed. They have both benefited a great deal from the technique sets they undertook in the latter part of each session and the coaching has greatly increased their understanding of the drills used in training and why they are undertaken.
The advice they were given was excellent and they will hopefully be a little more focused, we could visibly see our younger daughters style improve over the week when she was made to think about each stroke in detail.The coach was great and so were all the kids, the location was superb and breakfast afterwards even better, we will definitely be going again!! many thanks!!"

Hi

Just wanted to say thanks for your help with my swimming. Having just set another 1500m PB I thought it only right to give some feedback on the genuine impact of Swim Therapy on an ordinary 38 year old age group triathlete.

My swimming is entirely self taught and until recently my 1500m PB was 25:30 (achieved 6 years ago and completed in a state of near exhaustion that would have rendered completion of a triathlon impossible). In the last 2 years my best has been 26:30 in Jan 2010.

On 25 Feb 2010 I visited Swim Therapy for a 90 min session at which time you identified amongst my (many) faults - hip position/leg drag, head position/movement and a massive crossover in my freestyle arm stroke.

I can’t claim to have addressed all my issues but took this analysis away and stopped my long sessions altogether for about 6 weeks, concentrating on stroke, drills and shorter repeat sets.

Result - Since mid Apr, I still only swim 3 sessions a week for no more than 30-45 mins but when I do allow myself a 1500m time trial, I am now hitting sub 24:40 every time and have a new PB of 24:13. Even on my PB I felt easy, long and fluid and could happily have continued a triathlon afterwards. I now have my sights set on slowly cruising to sub 24 mins!

I simply cannot stress enough the benefit of the wisdom and analysis I received to open my eyes to what I was doing, allowing me to address these faults rather than just train harder.

Best money spent on sport in years!

Regards

Dave - Triathlete

Hi Nigel,
Both Alex and Daniella thoroughly enjoyed the Easter Swimcamp, an excellent mix of both technical tips and hard work, with a bit of fun thrown in for good measure.

Fantastic, thank you for everything. See you again.

Alex and Dani Lima (CMKSC)

Hi

A quick message for matt, James got his midlands time on his 200im and a personal best on his breaststroke by over three seconds.

I know its not a quick fix, but just one or two minor adjustments that he has remembered to do from your coaching session has helped him immensely this weekend, i know he will keep on watching the dvd and hopefully will only get better and better.

Many thanks

Phil Bell

Nigel

Many thanks for coaching the kids the other week, they thoroughly enjoyed it. Whilst taking in some of the techniques will take some time and thinking about for them, the immediate results at Rugby Open, a week after the camp, was 6 second PB for Abigail on 200FR and for Sam a 2.5 sec PB on 200BR and a 1.5 Sec PB on 100FR. Particularly for Sam these represent massive milestones as in the past he has gone months without PBing, and yet this last weekend we get four in total.

We will definitely back.

Regards

John

Hi Nigel,
thank-you for the week, with William being a very young swimmer it was a great experience for him to swim with swimmers from other clubs, he enjoyed the week very much.
In our view, apart from being excellent value for money, the sessions had the right balance of technical teaching, endurance work and fun.

"My daughter had a great time at the easter swim camp. It has given her more confidence and definitely has increased her love for swimming! It was hard work but great fun at the same time and very different from what she was used to...which she loved!! The advice she was given was also spot on and will now, hopefully, give her something to focus on. The coach was great and so were the kids....will definitely be going again!! many thanks!!"

Every day there was a great 2 hour training session with the last half hour being a technique set which was very good and I felt that I learnt a lot! The Olympics on the Friday was the most fun session as it was mainly races. Following the Tuesday night training getting up on the Wednesday for morning training was hard but well worth it, especially with Nigel- a fab coach! The site was good too apart from the weather!

Hi
On behalf of my daughter Sarah Smith and myself, we'd like to express our thanks to Steve Lay for the session Sarah had with him on Wednesday 3rd March 2010. Sarah competed at the Warwickshires on Saturday and came away with a silver for the 100m Fly in a new long course pb. She was extremely close to her short course pb, so we are hopeful of a good time when she is next competing in a 25m pool. Not only did you help with improving her technique, but I felt she came away with a new feeling of confidence in her capabilities as a swimmer, which showed in her performance on Saturday.

One again our sincere thanks.

Sarah Smith
Leamington Swimming Club
And her mum.

Dear Steve,

Thanks very much for the session yesterday and all the help and advice. It was all very very useful and I have lots to practice. It was an excellent 2 hours and your coaching technique was brilliant.

Best wishes. Hope to see you again sometime, when I hope you will see some improvement!!

Cris Swinhoe

Hi

Ben Friel aged 11 and James aged 8 really enjoyed their coaching with Matt , We live in Nz so wont be back for a while but it was well worth it .

Both boys look a lot stronger in the lessons they are in and James has moved up a group .They only swim once a week but do lots of other sports .Although James is only eight he seemed to have taken it all in,breathing , body position and keeping stomach in.

Ben has improved in both Breaststroke and freestyle.

Thanks again Matt

Ben and James Friel nz

Hi,

We would like to say thank to Steve for the excellent session at swim therapy last Friday.

Being relative beginners we knew there would be plenty of areas to be improved. Steve was really encouraging throughout both our sessions and left us feeling enthusiastic and that improvements are just around the corner. The drills and advice on the DVD were excellent; we are already chipping away at our best times.

I'm sure we will be back again in the near future.

Cheers,
Andy and Joanna

Hello Nigel
Just felt that I had to let you know that David really enjoyed / benefited from his session with Matt on Tues. David does not really enjoy swimming and simply sees it as a means to an end, but after swimming on Wed and putting into practice Matt's advice he said that he was actually 'quite excited about swimming'!! He really enjoyed implementing the advice and from pool side the difference in his recovery over the water was markedly improved as soon as he got in the pool!!
Can you please let Matt know how pleased David is with what he has learned and that he is already noticing a difference - he also feels that he is going much faster - but his shoulders did ache.
Regards
Julie

Hi there just to let you know that after Matt's excellent coaching with my son William swam a 3 second pb over 50m for Butterfly 37.94 at the Worksop Dolphins open meet at Ponds Forge. Thanks Raymond Gayne ps we'll be back.

Thankyou for the time spent with the girls on Friday. They were both really
impressed as was I. Thanks for the CD's can't believe how quickly you turned
them round.

The girls trained last night, felt great with their Backstroke and came out laughing over front crawl - they'd tried to fix everything in one go and got in a muddle!

Your input has really made them sit and think about how they swim and their own role in their development - something they have not been too hot on! So thankyou once again and hopefully we will get down again in the New Year.

Yours Susan Lowe

Philip Allen here, the self obsessed triathlete who was trying to achieve 12 min for 750m. Well I completed a tri event just today and wanted to give you some feedback.

You may recall that two weeks prior to seeing you I recorded my swim pb as 13.30ish. After our 90 min session I really wanted to assess how much impact swim therapies technique in the water had over aerobic workout using my old technique. In 4 yes only 4x45 measly min drill sessions I completed between our 90 min session and the race (approx 4 weeks) I finished today , I posted a swim time of 12.46. so due to our time together I’ve shaved off 45 sec which is quite incredible. A big thank-you to you for helping gain some dignity and street cred back.

Hi Nigel

Just to say thanks very much to Matt for my session this morning, it's really given me a lift and renewed my enthusiasm for my swimming.

I've just got back from a swim and feel very encoraged by my first attempts at the improvements we worked on this morning and am looking forward to my next session on Friday.

Thanks again

Regards

Suzanne

Sorry for not
> getting back to you sooner but I have just completed my first gala
> since I have been using my new techniques that you taught me. You were
> right about the 4 weeks before I get used to it. The results were fantastic!
> I did a 3 second pb on my 100 back and 11 second pb on my 100 fly!!!.
> Thank you so much, although there still is a long way to go you have
> given me so much confidence. I will definately be back.
> Jessie S

To Swim Therapy, l'd like to thank Matt for the great training session we had. We came for the full two hours and managed to go through two strokes in some depth. It was really beneficial for our daughter to be able to see exactly the faults in her stroke. We then received excellent professional advice on how to put them right. Not knowing what to expect when we came, our daughter left feeling really positive about amendments she could use in her training which will benefit her technique. As good as our coaches are they can not give that one to one coaching over a two hour period. What makes the difference is being able to see what they are doing wrong, this gave her the chance to analysis her own stroke in a stress free environment and get a DVD after to reinforce the message.

Tracey Hammond
Hatfield

Finn really enjoyed his swim therapy session. He is 8 years old and Matt pitched the coaching at just the right level and once Finn had overcome his initial shyness he got a lot out of the session. It was really useful for him to compare his stroke to the correct stroke shown on the monitor and a great way for him to understand where he could improve. He enjoys watching himself on the dvd and it reminds him what he should be doing. Finn is coming back in the Easter holidays to see where he can improve further!!

Many Thanks

Louise Nicholas