When you boil it down, a swim taper is an unnatural thing. It is an anomalous moment wedged in between two highly structured bookends (or not depending on the coach). It is a period of doubt, regret, happiness, anger, elation, anxiety and downright fear. The body tries to figure out what’s happening and the mind just helps to feed the paranoia. Like an alcoholic leaving rehab who meets his old drinking buddy on the street…

Did I wait too long? Did I start too early? Does my coach know what the hell he is doing? Do I know what I am doing? Did I work hard enough to get here? Do I have the right suit? Should I eat this, should I drink that? How many hours of sleep should I get? My college coach always put the team on a two week taper…what is this 8 day shit? And on and on and on…

Lots of great taper stories told by lots of great coaches…reading through some of them over the years I have found the underlying humor in the anecdotes of coaches who had an Olympian on taper…these Olympians who look so bold and brave on the blocks who only just a week before were in tears because they felt all wrong. Or the stories of the swimmers who snuck in an extra workout during taper when they thought their coach wasn’t aware because they felt like they needed it.

Of my three high school coaches, two gave the entire team a two week taper. Regardless of where you were in your training, two weeks out from division racing, you went on taper. The third coach I had actually let us pick the taper which was kind of nice in a way because I just elected not to taper so I could blame any poor performance on the fact that I wasn’t tapered. Nothing like an altruistically creative swimmer mind…

The very concept of taper itself, it seems, is anomalous. This coach starts 3 weeks out to bring their swimmer down from 75k a week while that coach starts 3 weeks out to bring their swimmer down from 18k a week. It’s understandable how a swimmer might be a little freaked out by that…The thing is though…and here is the real secret so be ready…the taper starts LOOOOOONG before a couple weeks out from your race. It starts the moment the cycle starts. Your coach, again assuming they are the type that pays attention, has been watching you since the first day you got in since your last big race. Their plan, as it is laid out, includes your peaks, valleys, work, rest, stroke, drill, kick and everything else…including the taper. Somewhere in their little notebook they have penciled in “taper starts here”…it may change a few days forward or backward but he or she knows…the way you just know about things.

Watching and recording split data day after day and watching the data closely against previous years and performances…it comes down to knowing your swimmer because, if you have done it right, you KNOW your swimmer. And if your swimmer knows that you know…well it just about makes things that much easier. That is not to say that when the coach knows and the swimmer knows that there still isn’t that anxiety. That Pavlovian response…well…not much you can do about that.

As a swimmer who has had so many tapers, I can speak from experience when I say that regardless of how much I trusted my coach, there was always that little voice in the back of my head…”I know my coach is right…but…maybe, just maybe, he screwed it up this time” As a coach who has given so many tapers, I can sympathize with the swimmer staring up at me from the water. To me as a coach though, taper is always a refinement and preparation process. An old coach of mine once told me “by the time you get to taper, if you ain’t got it, you ain’t gonna get it.” Sage advice indeed…translated loosely, “if you spent 5 months fucking around and you get to taper and expect magic, best go get a rabbit and a hat”…and that is the little voice in MY head whenever my swimmers get to taper. By that time, they have either accomplished the goal of the cycle or they haven’t. Either way, I am not going to tell them what I already know. At that point, their fate has already been decided and all you can do during the taper is set out to fix as many small technical issues as you can to give them the best possible chance. Sure you can sneak in a few more test sets and max sets and work sets in a taper…it’s not just all floating around…but the work is done.

I always like announcing taper to my swimmers at the conclusion of their last workout of the cycle (usually one of the most difficult of the session). I always shout “Welcome to taper!”. Some, that aren’t too tired, manage a smile…others, perhaps their face looks a little more grim…and so the taper begins. The bottom line is this…if you trust your coach, trust your coach. If you do not trust your coach, try harder TO trust your coach. If you can’t trust your coach, do a two week taper.

Isn’t taper great?