Thanksnfor playing. Those are fast times...is that send off time? Also how do you find with snorkel? I assume that is faster?

Those were the send-offs. The entire set wasn't done straight. I took short breaks throughout.

My first few 100's were about 1:20-:18 as times, and then I was doing about 1:13-:15 on the 1:20 intervals, and about 1:17 for the snorkels. I was about 1:21-:23 on the back-free swims, and finished off with some 1:13s on the last two overall.

25 yard pool.

IIRC, aren't you the guy who went 10,000 lcm in 2:16 last summer, or maybe it was 2016 or '15, for the USMS 10K postal event??? Assuming so, this pace implies around 1:21.6 per 100 lcm, or 1:20 per 100 scm, or about 1:12 per 100 scy. So, today was just an "average long" workout, just "a walk in the park" right???

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

Yes, one of those years I did the 10k pool in 2:16 or something. I'd have to go back and check. I didn't do today's swim straight through. It was more like a squad practice, with breaks here and there. I felt pretty good about it. It was my longest swim session in probably 16 months, and my longest-ever at altitude 5000'/1525m). I moved here back in August, and I guess I adjusted decently.

The key for this old guy was to go out smoothly, and ignore those around me at open lap time.

At one point, I thought about making that third round of 10 x 100 snorkel a 1000, but I'm easily distracted might have lost count. Instead, it was easier to know that 3 100s took 4:00 (1:20), and odd swims started on a :00, :10, or :20, etc while evens started on :05, :15, or :25, etc.

I usually keep track of distance in longer swims by swimming in 1/3 of a lane per 100. Next to the right side rope for 100, in the middle for 100, next to the left for 100, back to the middle for 100, and back to the right rope for 100. That way, I'm always at the 500-900-1300-1700 etc when I get back to the first side I started on. But I didn't want to be "that guy" who Hogs the whole lane, so I pretty much just kept to one side.

I swam 5000m for time in September in 1:14:xx with little altitude adjustment and indifferent swimming all summer.

Ah, that's what I thought, just a long squad practice. JOOC, what are your best 500, 1000, and/or 1650 times in the last few years, and what were your best times at your peak as a swimmer??? I'm guessing around 4:35, 9:20, and 16:00 back at your peak???

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

I went 17:33 at USMS Nationals in San Antonio in 2015. As a pure distance swimmer, especially after a dozen years doing marathons and IM, my last 150 of my 1650 was faster than my last 150 of my 500 (5:11ish). I also did a 4:32/9:38/18:14 in the 400-800-1500 in 2013.

I was 4:38 and 16:10 in college, and my 1000 split was in that 1650. I didn't swim a separate 1000 in a championship meet in college.

Ha, I was pretty darned close!!! And how old are you now??? Your college times are similar to "veloci-buddha" and STP here on ST. Also, if you would not mind saying, where did you swim in college??? Did you swim all 4 yrs???

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

I just turned 46. I swam all four years of college at Emory University, a Div III college.

Hey when you were swimming IM's how fast did you swim those and how much or how little swimming did you do during that time?

I did Louisville IM in 2008-10, after hanging out at the bike mount in the initial race in 2007. It totally made sense for me to do it, since I was coming off marathons (Boston '07), I lived 75 miles away and was dating a woman who lived in Louisville (who became my wife and IM Loo '14), and swimming would be no problem at all. I hadn't done much swimming at all since 2000, even though I was a college swim coach from '98-2010. I also was treated for Hodgkin Lymphoma in late '99 to mid 2000. From the end of my treatments, I did 9 stand-alone marathons until I did my first IM in 2008.

I swam probably more than I needed to while training for IM, since I should have used one more day on the bike. I didn't train all that hard while swimming, however, just 3500-4000y/m sessions 3-4 times per week.

My IM's were all in Louisville, so the swims were all in the Ohio River. There is a reputation for a downstream segment of the swim, so take my splits with a grain of salt: :57:xx, :57:xx, and :55:xx. I was 36-38 then. I'm training almost exclusively swimming now.

Ha, i swam at Johns Hopkins so we were big D3 rivals!!!

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

When was that? The 1990-91 team sported "NPA" tee-shirts at UAA's in Rochester.

"What are you talking about? We don't know what NPA means." ;)

I won the 200 free in 1993 at UAA's in the slowest winning time ever. I shared the SOY award with a Blue Jay who was much more deserving than I. I still have no idea how I was even mentioned in the same breath, and the picture of me receiving that award on the stand at Wash U showed me looking almost embarrassed. 'Dinger won the 50 free at NCAA that year in our pool.

I graduated in '94. When were you in Baltimore?

I was at Hopkins from 1972-76. I'm 62 right now but will turn 63 in late Jan. I don't generally discuss my age on ST b/c in many ways age is just another excuse. Those were heady days at The Hop, very hard academically but fun all the same. I learned my time management skills on the Hopkins swimming team. :)

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

I did tuesday 7.8 ( getting old it was wednesday and friday lol )
thursday 6.2
and sunday first ever 10 k swim 2h .54 total 10.3 k . swam with drag shorts as i had forgoten togs
1 k no toys with ( 1 k sraight and then 400 or 200 ) alternated 1 k pull mostly straight ks or 400 400 200 )
10.3k after 3 hours since i had never done a 3 hour swim session either
i guess with the drag shorts on my 10 k ,without pull and proper togs would have been very similar ( i usually gain about 5 sec pulling and lose approx 2.5 s per 100 m with those drag shorts)

didnt want to go straight in 10 k so plan was 7 , 7 ,10 ( when i was at 7 on thusday i thought i do 7.6 as i had never done double IM swim and thurdsady wanted to do 7 but the pool closed after 6,2
the monday swim was way way harder than the 10k swim (started out a bit too fast on tuesday and struggled with turns as i had not swam in 50 m pool for a while and had not really swam more than 4 k this year k, 5 to 7 were horrible )
thursday swim was quite nice and sunday swim was actually quite enjoyable especially the first 5 k when i had somebody drafting me.

Thank you very much for taking the time to post your data files.
They were interesting to me.

Yeah, no problem. I really like being able to refer back to some key parameters like HR, stroke rate, SWOLF relative to how I felt during the Swim. There are often days where I am thinking one thing in the course of the effort and realize I could have gone a little harder, should have backed off, etc.

For example, on this 10k effort, I think I could probably worked to take 1-2sec/100 off on phases 1 and 2 and then gone the last 60 months at 1:25pace without too much problem to cut out another 4min or so. Hard to prove, but I’ll do it again a little later.

At the moment I am in a training block strictly focusing on “time on feet” staying away from any intensity, so I wanted to keep everything pretty easy and then tackle it again when I’ve free’d the reins a bit.

Maybe next year I can play with the big kids.

Swam 5,500 yards this morning: 1,500 straight; 3x500 pull; 4x250; 15x100 on 1:45.

What this tiny little endeavor taught me: I need to swim more and bigger yardage is nothing to be worried about. I hate resolutions, but I'm joining a masters team and plan on finally attacking my gaping weak spot.

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@floathammerholdon | @partners_in_tri

Long swims in practice are just like long runs in training. Go out easily and manage yourself, and there's nothing to be afraid of. BUT, the difference with swimming are that you can get out of the pool, and your postural muscles won't be shot. That means you'll be able to walk away from it and have a relatively normal day, other than being so hungry you could eat the entire Chinese buffet. It's different from all day in that your "taint" won't be hurting.

When I was in HS and college, our winter "training camps," either at our home pools or at a warm-weather site, were all about volume. I remember doing upwards of 17km per day over two sessions per day, over almost two weeks. We'd do doubles every day but Christmas Eve (only one per day) and Christmas (day off). On NYD, we'd usually be in for once for 3-4 hours, doing X x 100, where X was the year we were starting.

A year after I switched to a new club team, my former club team initiated "triples" during the winter break. They'd do a morning swim at 6-8, then go over to a teammates' house, where parents, on a rotating basis, would set up a large breakfast. After that, the swimmers would go to the Rec room or den, and take naps on the sleeping bags they brought. They'd wake for a midday practice at 11-1:30, then go home for lunch, and meet again for the evening practice, usually from 4-7 or something. I thought that was INSANE, and I'm glad I left.

One team would do a famous 24 hour practice over Memorial Day every year. They'd have two practices on Friday, and then start the 24 hour practice at 6am on Saturday. That consisted of 3 hours on, 1 hour off, for 24 hours. In the afternoon, they'd have a dual meet against another club team, all in their indoor 50m pool on the grounds of Foxcatcher.... Yes. THAT Foxcatcher....

So, just out of sheer curiosity, what does "NPA" stand for??? Speaking of T-shirts, at Hopkins, the sports teams were known as the "Blue Jays", and our coach was Frank Comfort, who happened to be from North Carolina. So, some clever swimmer devised swimming T-shirts saying on the front: "Hopkins Swimming, fueled by Southern Comfort" with a picture of the whiskey bottle, and then on the back: "Smoke 'em Jays" with of course a big joint. Leave to Hop guys to come up with as many plays on words as possible; of course alcohol and cannabis use were widespread among swimmers. :)

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

The Hop guys were a bit coy about it. Mostly, they wanted people to think it mean "No P-----s Allowed," but since it wasn't written out, they could have plausible deniability that that was the meaning. I can't imagine George Kennedy clearing that meaning, so it must have meant something else.

OK OK OK....I need intervention from real swimmers around here.

So what's the deal on claiming a 10K swim in a pool. I would have thought you really can't claim anything if there are any of the following involved:

1. Pull Buoy
2. Paddles
3. Fins
4. Neoprene shorts
5. Those funky web gloves

Basically anything that would be banned in a FINA swim meet, I would consider as "outside assistance". So what's the general protocol that real swimmers go by for self generated challenges like this. Just trying to understand what people with real swim pedigree would say is cool. I am going with sticking with FINA rules.


If it was open water, I'd use the same wetsuit cutoff as an IM, but i am sure real swimmers would say no wetsuit and vaseline up!

If you're talking a straight 10,000 m for time as we swim for the USMS postal event each summer, then ya, no pull buoys, fins, etc. OTOH, if we're "just" talking a 10,000 yd/m workout, sure, use whatever you want, or whatever your coach specifies. I've never counted them up but i believe i've done 400 or more 10,000 yd or longer workouts over the years, so just for variety IM sets, kick sets, paddle sets, etc, were involved.

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

Now that you've planted the seed of what NPA could mean in my mind, it occurs to me that it could also mean "No Pansies Allowed". I've met George a few times since he took over from Frank Comfort in '84, and agree that he def would not want the verboten meaning to be said aloud. Comfort went from Hopkins to UNC to coach the Tar Heels from '84 to around 2008 or thereabouts. Almost every year 1-4 top swimmers from our club team (Tenn Aquatics) go to swim at Carolina. To my knowledge, only a handful of swimmers from this area have ever gone to swim at Hopkins (only one that i know of but prob 2 or 3 more over the yrs), but I understand that 1 or 2 do go every year to swim at Emory. I think part of it is that Atlanta and Chapel Hill are both a bit closer to Knoxville than Baltimore. On Christmas Eve two years ago, I swam a 30 x 100 scm on 1:45 set circling with an Emory guy and a Carolina girl, so it was a relatively long rest for them and a bit shorter for me. :)

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

First my list of excuses. My goal was 5500SCY doing a 1000p on 15minutes followed by a 100 IM on 2. Been out of the water for over a week and only pool I can get in is the clubhouse one, no lane lines or gutters, but it does have targets on the walls, so kind of like swimming OW once I get it churned up. Swimming backstroke blind is horrible, I drifted at least a lanes worth every time I had to swim it..

4x1000p + 100IM @ 17;00 (14;34/14;03/13;59/13;56) IM's 1;28/27/26/25
100IM kick
4500SCY in 1 hour 10

Got to the end of the 100 with horrible toe cramps and just made it in. Couldn't figure out why until I realized that instead of swimming all last week, I did two one hour MTB rides. My feet were just not ready for that and rebelled. But it was the longest workout in a very long time, so pleased with that. Was on pace for a 1;25 5k swim with some IM in there, double that and I get my 10k patch in 2 hours 50!!!

Thanks for the challenge, will add more IM next time and hopefully distance too. I used the pulling gear as I just did not want to fight the turbulence in that pool, it kept me on the surface in reasonable shape. You can put an * next to my swim..(-;

Happy new year!!! I need a nap now...

Monty, the big "event" for next year is 10000m swim with 2500m fly, 1250 back, 1250 breast, 5000 free. I think I can get there. Now the question is how long it takes....yes, I want to break 3 hours for that....better technique, same fitness, shorter rest!!!

Happy New year....I managed a treadmill shuffle today as the pool was closed (oh man, I just violated my rule for this thread to Tigerchik talking about running on a dolphin thread). Back in dolphin mode tomorrow starting training for 2018 December 10,000m smackdown. Maybe I will have the Canadian communist health care system get me thru the queue, have my disc surgery and even get to bike before then!!!