Today I want to talk about why I believe swimming needs its own mindset approach.
I’m convinced that for mindset training to be truly effective it needs to be tailored to the specifics of the sport you’re in. I see way too many generic “all sports” solutions out there, and I don’t buy that they work. Recently I got an email about a course that promises “unshakable confidence” in 30 days. The testimonials came from soccer, volleyball, handball, gymnastics, esports—you name it. The claim was that this one course was designed for athletes across all sports.
For me, that’s a red flag.
Yes, there are principles that carry across sports. But athletes respond better when you talk their language so they don’t have to mentally translate everything. Swimmers don’t want to hear about “the field” or “playing time.” That’s not our world. If I’m a swimmer and that’s the language being used, I’m tuning out.
There are also real differences between sports that are primarily skill‑based (golf, gymnastics, figure skating, fencing) and those that are endurance‑based (swimming, running, cross‑country skiing, speed skating). In endurance sports, skill matters, but the outcome is ultimately about who gets from point A to point B faster. When endurance is part of the equation, everything about mindset shifts.
Swimming adds another layer of complexity because of the range of events. From a 50 to a 1,650 and everything in between, the mental approach cannot be one‑size‑fits‑all. How you prepare your mind for a 50 is radically different from how you prepare for a mile. You have almost no time to think in a 50—and arguably too much time to think in a 1,650.
And then there’s the most important piece: swimmers compete in a literal bubble.
Unlike athletes in other sports, swimmers compete in an isolation chamber. You don’t know where you are until you finish and have that iconic “look at the clock and react” moment. If you’re a swimmer, coach, or swim parent, you know exactly what I’m talking about.
During a race, a swimmer’s mind is naturally going to try to assess, “How am I doing?”—but there’s no reliable data. You might be way ahead of someone you’ve never beaten before, or behind someone seeded ten seconds slower. You might feel amazing. You might feel terrible. Any of those scenarios can flip your mindset in an instant.
In every other sport I can think of, the athlete gets some kind of live feedback: the score, the field, the opponent right in front of them. Swimming doesn’t give you that. That’s precisely why I believe mindset training for swimmers has to be swim‑specific, not borrowed and repackaged from everywhere else.
So I’m curious: are you comfortable with “for all athletes” mindset approaches, or do you believe swimmers deserve something designed specifically for the way we race?