Pre-race strategies contain all the thoughts and actions that need to take place to prepare an athlete to start a race with the best form of race readiness. The main outcomes of these preparations are to: Minimize the effects of distractions on the swimmer's appraisal of preparations for racing. Focus the athlete's attention on the race. Control the development of race readiness so that it will peak at the race start. The content of this discussion is limited to actions on the day of a race. It recognizes that some athletes start their preparations as much as two days before important contests. When that is the case, the suggestions here should be extended and repeated to consume the total time-period between the first instance of race-awareness and the race start.