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The Water Confidence Scorecard
Most people who are afraid of water have been told to relax, and it has never once worked. It does not work because fear of water is not a mindset. It is a threat response your nervous system learned, and it comes out in your breath before you have decided anything.
This asks twenty questions about what your body actually does in water. You get a score, and something more useful than a score: the stage of the nine-stage protocol you should start at this week.
What it measures
Four of these are the protocol’s own progression, in order. The fifth runs underneath all of them and decides how fast you can go.
01
Breath
Whether you can breathe out in water, or whether you are holding on to it without noticing.
02
Presence
Whether you are in your body while you swim, or somewhere above it watching the exit.
03
Buoyancy
Whether you trust the water to hold you, or whether you are still doing the job yourself.
04
Rhythm
Whether movement has settled into a pattern, or is still a fight you have to win each time.
05
Recovery
What your body does after a scare, and how much of your progress survives to next week.
Who wrote this
Jason Cram swam for Australia. Commonwealth Games gold in 2002, Pan Pacific champion the same year, World Champion in 2003. He has spent the eighteen years since coaching, and a lot of that time has been in the shallow end with adults who had decided they were not water people.
The nine stages behind this scorecard came out of that work. They are a nervous-system protocol, not a technique ladder, which is why the first one has nothing to do with swimming.
This is written for adults. It is coaching, and it is not therapy or medical advice. If what you are carrying is bigger than the water, talk to your GP as well as to us.