In a sport where mental toughness and physical strength are necessary, it doesn't hurt to have a coach that exemplifies these qualities.
Jim Bolster, in his 14th year as the Men's Swim Team Head Coach does possess such qualities. His athletic success, years of coaching, and sense of competitive sportsmanship demonstrate the mental toughness necessary to coach a successful swim team.
"I think he's a great coach," junior Gered Doherty said. "He's been here for 14 years, and I think he is one of the better coaches we have at this institution." Bolster's credentials for coaching have resulted from a very strong athletic background. As an athlete at Dennison University, he not only was a star swimmer, winning the 1976 NCAA Championships in the 200-meter butterfly, but he also was a starter and a letter winner in soccer and lacrosse. After graduating in 1977, he was drafted in the first round of the North American Soccer League, playing for two years with Connecticut and Washington.
More recently, Bolster has competed several times, as an amateur triathlete and, later, as a competitive cyclist.
Bolster's strong athletic background surely translates to solid coaching ability. The coach looks to train his athletes effectively, finding a balance between physical and mental preparation.
"He's very involved, educated, and experienced in swimming and fitness and has had an effect on the way I train, eat, and see myself as a swimmer," Doherty said. The entire season - including pre-season workouts, dual meets, a training trip in Hawaii, and double practices - all lead up to the EISL Championships (Easterns) in March. As the meet approaches, Bolster will employ two techniques with his squad: shaving and tapering. The idea behind shaving is that a swimmer shaves his entire body in order to lessen the drag, or friction, in the water. Although Bolster attributes some speed to shaving, he recognizes that it is not an exact science, and much of the benefits are mental.
"[Shaving is for] fine tuning, looking for the right rhythms, both physically and mentally," Bolster said.
Moreover, shaving too often can work against a team; swimming unshaven in less important meets serves conditioning purposes, allowing the athletes to strengthen their muscles. Because of this tactic, shaving must be a planned process, rather than a regular event.
Bolster's other strategy, tapering, involves reducing the intensity of practices in order to let swimmers rest their muscles, preserving their energy for important meets. As Easterns approach, Bolster will taper the workouts as well as and ask his swimmers to shave, hopefully to strike a perfect balance between mental and physical readiness. "It can't be left unsaid that Jim is a little unorthodox," Doherty said. "He does things different than everyone else, and I like that. It's very easy to get bored or burned out in swimming, and I think Jim is successful in not letting that happen to the sprinters." Although Bolster is very optimistic, he sets realistic goals for his athletes. In the beginning of the season, he hoped for a winning record in dual meets and an improvement on last year's sixth place finish at Easterns. The team has been steadily improving over the course of the season. The Lions are now 4-4, on their way to a winning season. "There has been no indication that we won't put in a good battle [at Easterns] for 3rd, 4th, or 5th place," Bolster said. Bolster mentioned that Harvard and Princeton would most likely capture the top two spots of the tournament.
Bolster also seems to encourage good sportsmanship and healthy rivalries between teams. This Saturday's meet versus Pennsylvania is the continuation of a deeply rooted rivalry between the Lions and the Quakers.
While Bolster may be able to attribute some of the origins of the rivalry to an incident that happened several years ago at Pennsylvania, he looks at it as a healthy rivalry between two comparable schools.
Bolster is impressed with his team this year, especially with the new energy that the first-year swimmers bring to the pool. "In a non-threatening way [the firs-years] have made their presence felt," Bolster said. "They have given the juniors and seniors a new sense of focus."
In addition to recruiting this top-notch class, Bolster brings his own experiences and attitudes to the pool deck, inspiring and leading the team as they near the end of their already successful season.
The Lions have their fingers crossed that Bolster's strategies will pay off as they enter the homestretch of their Ivy League schedule. "He does do things differently, but that is what makes him a good coach he's not like everyone else," Doherty said.