RICHMOND RAPIDS OPERATING PHILOSOPHY
Our message to swimmers and parents:
We are pleased to provide you with this opportunity for the pursuit of excellence. Staff, parents and swimmers are individually and collectively responsible for protecting our mission.
We aim to continually create and maintain a unique and special program that supports unique and special accomplishments. Swimming is like no other sport your child will participate in. The aquatic environment is unique, the training is unique and the time required to gain competency is unique. The development program will guide our swimmer toward their desired level of swimming excellence.
In order to foster that excellence, we must act in accordance with our mission. This requires attention to the goal to excel.
TEAM PHILOSOPHY
RESPECT every team member. Treat everyone, including yourself, with respect, dignity, and consideration. Respect everyone, including your own, right to pursue goals consistent with team purpose.
ACCEPT that each Rapids member is important. Everyone has the opportunity to participate and to make a contribution. Your acceptance and support of all team members is expected and appreciated.
ACKNOWLEDGE every team member. In our program, everyone counts. No one is invisible. Let everyone know that he/she is noticed and appreciated.
VALUE SWIMMING EXCELLENCE We choose to hold fast swimming, good training and thorough preparation in extremely high regard. Welcome difficult, goal oriented challenges. Seek out challenges that will help you swim faster and succeed. Seek out opportunities to swim more, harder, and better. Act as if you want to train and you want to race. Relish and protect each opportunity. If you encounter doubts or fears, please talk to your coaches about them. Don’t mask them and please don’t express them in a way that could cause others to doubt or fear.
CONTRIBUTE. We expect you to continually contribute to our program and to foster our mission by doing the following both in and out of the pool:
Support everyone’s efforts.
Encourage everyone’s actions.
Challenge everyone to take action.
Compliment and applaud everyone’s efforts.
Advocate the Richmond Rapids: We expect every team member to act as an advocate for our program. Say nothing but good things about our program, our staff, and our team members. If you notice inadequacies, raise the issue within the club to the club President or the Director of Swimming, but continue to serve as Richmond Rapids ambassador to the swimming world. We will not speak ill of any aspects of our program, team-mates, coaches, staff, or sponsors.
Make it Fun. Enjoy your swimming. Express your enjoyment of training and competing. Encourage others to talk about the fun. Note that there is a huge difference between making the pursuit of swimming excellence fun and having fun
at the expense of the pursuit of swimming excellence.
Appreciate everyone’s respect, acceptance, support, encouragement, compliments, challenges, and appreciation. Express you appreciation for such support.
