Well, Sanders is using it in his set:

https://lsanderstri.com/...0/swim-update-1/amp/

I know RealAB likes his. I've never tried one, so I can't really comment on the experience of using one.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

I think it's worth while. It's a very valuable pacing tool so long as you don't let it become a crutch (in other words, you become dependent on it).

If you are FOP swimmer you are far better off taking all that pool time and converting it to bike or run training. Sure you could gain a minute or two in the water, but for the same time investment you could gain 5 or 10 minutes on the road.

but some of us get so bored repeating 100s on the 1:10. It would be so much cooler to do it on the 1:05 ;-)

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maybe she's born with it, maybe it's chlorine
If you're injured and need some sympathy, PM me and I'm very happy to write back.
disclaimer: PhD not MD

I'd love to try one, so let us know how it works for you.
Some other things to consider: how's your sighting? Your first 200 yards or so in OW - can you get out of the gate (as it were) fast enough to not be caught in the crowd? The latter is low-hanging fruit for OW swimming, I think.

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maybe she's born with it, maybe it's chlorine
If you're injured and need some sympathy, PM me and I'm very happy to write back.
disclaimer: PhD not MD

I'm MOP, inching towards front-MOP on the swim. I've been using a tempo trainer for about a year now (swimming for 2.5 yrs total) and it has been eye opening to how slow of a stroke rate I had. This alone accounted for one of my early jumps in speed over the past year. I think it's a great tool to have around. When you get one, the easiest way to get started is to set it to "mode 3" and then adjust the numbers to a desired "strokes per minute". If you're FOP, I'd try it on like 80 to see about where you land. I'm like 72 right now for non-sprint sets.

I'm in this camp and 100% agree. Personally I abhor any battery-powered device in a pool!

I recently joined a Masters team with a few triathletes but most are open-water swimmers, and recently our coach handed out these things at practice. He had them set to a certain pace rather than a stroke rate. I thought this was just a cop-out from watching the clock while you're swimming long sets, but in hindsight you don't get any aid in a race so why bother with either option?

Do you swim alone or with a team? If you are alone, youÂ’re giving up at least 10% of the gains you could get with a team.

Are you in the weight room?

How many days a week do you swim?

Do you swim workouts similar to your college days?

Would you be willing to do 5-7 weeks in a row of filming while you swim hard in between each filming session?

All of the above questions point to areas of bigger potential gains than a tempo trainer. If you are looking to be a faster open water distance swimmer and you have a college swim background, your tempo should be somewhere between 1.5 and 1.8. If I had to guess, you are probably about 2.0 - 2.2 right now.

Hope this helps.

Tim

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http://www.magnoliamasters.com
http://www.snappingtortuga.com
http://www.swimeasyspeed.com

I swim with a team

No, weight room. From all my swimming years, I am top heavy to begin with..so I worry about putting on more muscle mass.

2-3 days of swimming

My swim workouts don't resemble anything like college days. If they did I don't think I would have the energy to Run or Bike on those days

5 weeks of filming? Just curious why so long?

I will try out the tempo trainer..why not.

I would consider doing some weights. I grew up a swimmer also and in my mid-40s started losing strength. I added in weights twice a week and felt much stronger in the water. I am a female and in my late 40s (just turned 50) was top female amateur (:57) out of the water in an iron and FOP in others. One of my daughters swims in college- D1. I looked at her weight training protocol. She got so much stronger and faster as she began doing weights/land. I too was concerned as I am built like a swimmer (broad shoulders) and I didn't want to bulk up. I just did a variety of weights for 20 minutes and I didn't do heavy weights. Just enough that made me feel stronger in the water. My goal in all this has never been to be the fastest swimmer ....it's to come out of the water feeling fabulous :) so when I get on my bike I feel great. On my bike it's the same ....be the most fit so when I get to my run I can nail it! If you are focusing on long-distance, ask yourself, what is going to make you the most fit aka fatigue resistant... not necessarily the fastest.

Practice harder or practice more!!

Marginal gains?
Who cares about marginal gains?
My 500 time is 45 seconds slower than my college PR.
There is nothing marginal about that!

Why am I so much slower?
I am only doing 20% the volume of what I did.
And almost none of that training is hard.

Sure, I could fool around with toys, cameras and weight training.
But that would just turn me into a triathlete swimmer, or worse- a lap swimmer.
That would obviously NOT be an improvement.

Personally- I don't want to swim more.
And I don't want to train a lot harder.

To improve swimming- I think consistent sprint workouts, training with other ex-college swimmers, maybe some IM work- would offer the best return on time and effort.

I agree that we are barely swimming what we did as kids!! For me to stay fit at my old age , I just aim for three 3000s a week. My lane did not focus a lot on intervals, drills or pool toys, minus a pull set. We would swim quite aggressively and do not rest a lot. I do know some people need/want a lot offast intervals with good rest. I've tried that before and it does not give me enough bang for my buck. It would only make me a tiny bit faster. I definitely would do if I was racing 50, 100, 200s! This is odd for masters groups but in my lane we are a mix of former college swimmers, Olympians, and top in the nation tri-people. My key is to chase after them all these years. Thats what makes me fit! I completely agree with swimming with ex-college swimmers as a huge plus! Re: weights, look at all college swimming programs and you will see an enormous amount of dryland training. My husband went to trials in the 80's and they did insane dryland so I disagree that will make you a "triathlete" swimmer. That is legit old school swimming! We are all different though and what worked best for me got me to Kona twice! Best of luck!

What you'll find is just about any tool that should improve you will improve you... but just for a few workouts. And then you'll level out to maybe a second faster per 100yds. So the actual trick is to do the tempo trainer for a few workouts, then the drag chute for a few, then lots of butterfly for a few, then hand paddles or whatever strikes your fancy. I think this is because each is a marginal gain and is great if you could use them very frequently, but you aren't swimming 2 hours a day every day like you used to, so you can't get that volume and exposure to ALL the tools that would make you super duper fast again. Using all the tools all the time would work wonders, but you only have time for one tool to make an impact and it's impact is small. Thinking one thing is going to make a huge difference is like chasing that heroin dragon... you will just be a hungry ghost. But trying something that is proven to work will make a tiny gain, then switching to something else making a tiny gain, but a different type of tiny gain... that is variety and the spice of life that leads to happiness... in general. Results vary on one's delusion with reality. :)

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Zen and the Art of Triathlon. Strava Workout Log
Interviews with Chris McCormack, Helle Frederikson, Angela Naeth, and many more.
http://www.zentriathlon.com

Do you have a clock at your pool? Can you count your strokes as you swim? Can you divide the latter by what you see on the former with a bit of adjustment for turns?

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"Go yell at an M&M"

If you are a good swimmer already, a tempo trainer seems unlikely to be a thing that unlocks some sort of previously unknown speed. However, if your turnover is particularly slow for your speed, then it might be just the thing.

For my money, a tempo trainer is most useful in open water, when you can use the tempo trainer to help work on hammering out that same rhythm for the distance of the race. In the pool, I can't get rhythm of the trainer to work with my tempo, like I can't lock in on it. In the pool I prefer to set the tempo trainer to a given pace and use it to hold a given pace.

As for video, it could very well be worthwhile. But keep in mind you don't need a fancy setup for that. A friend with a gopro can get fine video.

With an inexpensive underwater camera, a pole mount, and 8 feet of 3/8" pvc pipe you can have your own underwater video setup for under $60. And it will take video much better than what we used to get with our $700 coach cams in early 2000s.

and don't overlook the utility of a normla above water video from someone's phone.

Personally....

I am definitely one of the fastest ex-college swimmers turned triathlete in the 45+ category. (Ritch Viola is faster).

There is very little return on investment (of time, money or attention) for me to focus on swimming.

Substantial gains would take a huge investment.
But .... substantial swimming gains would still be "marginal" for my overall triathlon performance.
And "Marginal" swimming gains are completely meaningless for triathlon.

When I focus on swimming it is therefore mostly "for fun."
Messing around with toys is not fun for me.

Sprinting, hanging out with other ex-swimmers, doing different stuff is fun.

I used to also ignore swimming completely and looked at the time vs. gain - and also felt it wasn't worth it. Then I started working with Matt Dixon and he instantly had me doing some pretty intense swim sessions. I actually really enjoyed it - and I am not a big fan of swimming laps!!! But the gains didn't come in my swim splits at all - the gains showed up in my bike, run and overall fitness. I started getting on the bike super fresh and it made a big difference in my overall triathlon performance.

In addition, adding tough swims doesn't crush the legs the way a tough bike or run will - so as a strong swimmer I was able to incorporate these sessions with minimal impact on my bike and run training. I say "strong swimmer" as I think those that are still learning - a 90 minute swim workout takes a lot out of them.

But these sessions were GROUP sessions and really hard to replicate that alone - thus I always drag at least one person with me for swim training.

Yeah this.

I was swimming 2 - 3 times a week, no more than 6km, I was coming top 20 for a 70.3, doubled mileage, finished top 10 consistently, top 3 for sprints, OD, but I reckon I knocked off no more than a minute for my 70.3 pb. Whereas the last 3 months I've been working on my run, knocked off 90s from my 5km sprint and over 4 minutes for my 70.3 run. It would have been closer to 8/9 minutes but it was unseasonably hot - 104F. Similarly with my bike, dropped my 70.3 bike pb from 2.29 to 2.25 in a relatively short space of time, with not a massive increase in training load. If you have your technique sorted, are a FOP swimmer, then swim 8 - 10kms a week, no more, focus on drafting (in the swim!) and work on bike/run - massive gains compared to swimming.