Stingrays Swimming Newsletter
April 1st, 2021
Spring Break
Stingrays swimmers (all groups) will have no practice over Spring Break. Spring Break will start after practice on Saturday, April 3rd. We will return to practice on Monday, April 12th.
Rest, Relax, Reflect - breaks are necessary and deserved to help the mind and body recover. Enjoy Spring Break and we will return ready to start working on a great Summer Season!
Welcome Coach Tom!
Coach Tom Keer comes to Stingrays from South Florida through Philadelphia and Connecticut. Tom grew up in the suburbs of Philadelphia qualifying for YMCA Nationals. Went on to swim in college at Southern Connecticut State University at graduation was top 5 in school history in the 200 butterfly. Spent over 20 years coaching with Swim Florida in Ft Myers. He has over 45 years in the sport and over 30 years of coaching experience.
Coaching Career.
“Coach Tom” was an assistant at Southern Connecticut as he finished up his degree. Working primarily with the stroke swimmers.
He then moved to South Florida for 20 years and coached club and high school. He Coached with Swim Florida at the Naples, FGCU and Ft Myers branch from 1995-2014. He has experience coaching Florida Age group champions, Junior National qualifiers, Future Qualifiers and Olympic Trial Qualifiers.
As a high school coach his team helped him to be named Southwest Florida coach of the year 4 times, Most recently in the Fall of 2020. The HS team has finished top 10 at states 8 times, have had 12 HS all-american, and 8 state champions.
From 2014-2018 He returned to his HS in the Suburbs of Philly and Founded Triton swim team. The team grew from 0 to over 100 kids in less than 3 years and had a Mid-Atlantic Junior Olympic champion.
In his return to Swim Florida from 2018-2021 Coach Tom had success with the Senior team and 9-11 year old team. The 9-11 sent 4 swimmers to FLAGS and the Senior Team had 4 new swimmers qualify for Futures.
Education
Coach Tom has his degree in Liberal Studies (Management, Computer Science , Communications) from Southern Connecticut, Teaching Certification (Math) from Florida Gulf Coast University and His MBA from Grand Canyon University. He is also completing his Life Coaching certification through John Maxwell.
3 things he believes in coaching: Be process focused, Excellence is a habit, and Attitude is everything. He has a weekly challenge video on youtube: Coach Tom34
Welcome Coach Ben!
Stingrays Swim Team coach Ben Munster has competitive and coaching experience from time spent with various swim teams across the country. Prior to joining Stingrays, Ben was a member of the coaching staff for the Mission Viejo Nadadores in Mission Viejo, California where he assisted with the 9-10 year-old swimmers and led the high school development group. Before moving to California Ben spent time with the Foothills Swim Team in Littleton, Colorado where he was responsible for inducting new members to the swim team by leading the group for 8 and under swimmers.
In addition to coaching at these two locations, Ben has taken advantage of opportunities to visit and learn from local resources including attending USA Swimming technique seminars at the Olympic Training Center in Fort Collins, Colorado, and volunteering with the UCSD Tritons swim team in San Diego, California. Ben was also a volunteer assistant swim coach for the Virginia Tech Men and Women’s swim teams for the 2013-2014 season.
Ben’s coaching philosophy rests upon the principles of proper technical swimming and developing young athletes in a progressive manner to achieve a swimmer’s individual goals. He is excited to begin his new position as Lead Age Group Coach at the Cherokee County Aquatic Center for Stingrays and hopes to contribute to sparking a lifelong interest in swimming for the swimmers he encounters.
Ben is a graduate from Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia where he swam under Dr. Ned Skinner and he also holds a Master’s degree in Water Resource Engineering from KU Leuven in Leuven, Belgium. When not swim coaching Ben is calibrating and validating water quality models and he enjoys playing the violin.