Overtraining

Question
I have a 10 year old female swimmer that is extremely motivated, ranked in the top five in the state in every sroke and has olympic dreams for 2016. My question is how much should she be swimming as a 10 year old to possibly reach her goal. I realize alot depends on the individual, but do you have any guidelines to follow to prevent over training. ie. 5000 meters per day etc??? I hope to hear from you...thanks

Answer
Mark--There really isn't a true guideline, but as a 10 yr. old, she should really keep her training under that 5000 m. per workout.  More than that and it's too easy to get burned out early no matter how motivated she is.  The best thing for her to do is work hard at the distances she does and really concentrate on making her techniques as close to perfect as possible.  That's her stroke technique and her start and turn techniques.  She'll keep improving more by doing that then by doing more distance.
Hope this helps,
George