The '96 Olympic Games of Atlanta heralded a new era in the Dutch swimming. Kirsten Vlieghuis won 2 bronze medals (400 m and 800 m freestyle), Pieter van den Hoogenband (4th place) and Marcel Wouda (4th place) managed to join with the world's top athletes and even our young relay teams unexpectedly reached the Olympic finals, something they had not succeeded in for many years. There seemed thus to be a successful future in store for the Dutch swimming team.
We in the Netherlands, of course, knew about lactate but until then we had seldom monitored training by means of lactate measurements, or to put it another way, the lactate tests results and their interpretation missed any direct link or "translation" to the training practice. What about the shift of the lactate curve? What is good? What is not? What is the real message of the lactate readings for the coach? What does a lactate value really tell us about the conditioning profile of the swimmer? The sciences did not seem to be able to provide an adequate, effective and conclusive answer to all the questions I, as a coach, was confronted with in the swimming pool! I felt my own experience, my own perception and my own views on training matched better with the results in competition than the dry sometimes even implausible scientific measurements. It was shortly after the Olympic Games that I got the opportunity to meet Jan Olbrecht, whom I, so far, only knew from his many (to me often unreadable) scientific contributions on lactate. Our first talk hit the mark; he provided the answers I had sought for so many years. Indeed, although I felt I was working in the right direction I could not always explain the swimmer's adaptations and evolution. Now, Jan unraveled in a scientific but still simple and quite comprehensible way - which was very much in contrast with what I expected from a dry professor - these inexplicable "evolvements". He corroborated my feelings as a coach and gave me the tools to understand what actually happened to my swimmers physiologically. Seen in this light, the lactate readings took on a completely new meaning. For the first time in my coaching career I had learned something new which was immediately workable and practicable in training. I really must say that our collaboration for the past 3 years has been very productive and has played an important part in the success of our team. Indeed, in view of the lactate test results Jan determines the workload each swimmer can sustain and assesses for each swimmer individually the appropriate training load and the most adequate strategies and implementations in training. This new scientific training approach does not imply I have to throw away my own specific training methods but it enables me to individualize and structure the training planning and periodization in a systematic, purposive and scientific way. The discussion we have each time on the test results is always very useful and instructive and teaches me a lot about the metabolic impact of the different workouts. I personally think this book should be considered as a manual for the modern coach who wants to know before planning and periodizing what kind of conditioning adaptations he may expect. It provides knowledge and shares experience but it is above all understandable and applicable to every training situation. It remains furthermore an enormous challenge to plan and apply the new training methods in the right way and at the right time. But do not think it will spare you work. Quite the contrary. It provides tools to systematically build up the appropriate training for each swimmer individually. The title of the book is clear but is in no way exaggerated - the performances of the Dutch National Swimming Team in general and the Eindhoven team in particular speak for themselves. The part Jan, together with his wife and right-hand Pascale played in that success goes without saying for which I really want to express my gratitude.