Sounds like you are in good form. Good luck on Sunday!

All of those swims on sub 60 degree temps show a lot of mental toughness. I swam open water Monday in 69 degrees and it felt good, but I can't imagine how cold 59 would feel.

Thanks Dev.

Hurt my foot on the stairs yesterday morning, slipped and bent the 3 outside toes way too far. It's pretty swollen this am, but feeling better (still not great) this evening.

Masters tonight, keeping up a little better in the lane. Only sat out the first 50 of one 100IM, so that's progress from Sunday and Monday when I felt like I would probably die.
Final set at masters was 6x50 on :60, felt far better than Monday. Held :35's and last one was a :34. Not fast, but better, at least.

Now it's time to reduce the swelling in my foot. Lying on the couch with my feet up and a glass of 15yr Glenfiddich.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

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

Ouch man....that does not sound fun (both the swollen foot and holding 35's for the 50's!!!). Get better and keep us informed. I also have question on my dolphin kick off the wall. Let's say I am swimming beside someone in the "other lane" at the same speed and hit the wall together and I dophin kick 1/3 of the pool, I am always exiting behind the person that pushes and starts swimming. At the moment I don't care cause I am trying to strengthen my core, BUT I believe underwater dolphin kick SHOULD be faster than someone swimming free at the surface. So any tips to make it faster. My streamline is pretty good per your advice. Should my underwater kick be more core driven or more hip and hamstring driven. Should it be "super tight"? Any advice is appreciated.

Jason, what do you think about the advice here:

https://www.yourswimlog.com/...rwater-dolphin-kick/

Core.

Imagine a propagating wave. Arms and head stationary, shoulders undulat a bit, chest a bit more, hips a bit more. Etc. There will be quite a bit of amplitude in your feet.

Try doing u/w dolphin on your back. I have no idea why, but for some people it is easier to do the dolphin kicking.

However, that doesn't mean that UW dolphin is always faster. For the top guys and guys with a strong kick it is, but I swim with a bunch of guys who have a weak/ineffective kick. Those guys are best off getting to the surface and swimming.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

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

Just browsed it quickly, but looks pretty sound to me

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

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

I think the mistake I have been making is focusing on the dolphin kick part behind my body instead of "in front" as the article refers to. Part of the reasoning why I have been working the "behind" is because in front crawl, when I kick I don't want to get too far "in front" and create a ton of drag, and I have been focusing on keeping my feet "up and behind" with the sole of my feet facing the roof of the pool. Same thing for fly, I don't want my feet coming down too far and turning into a boat anchor so trying to lift them back up quickly without a ton of amplitude. But underwater is different as it would make zero diff if the amplitude happens in front of behind anyway as long as it is generating propulsion. I'll try some of what they said in the article and report back. I THINK mine should be stronger given my core was above average strength (youth gymnastics, and then I actually held the sit up record at RMC for over a decade....128 in 2 minutes).....plus all the XC ski double poling. Let's see. But right now, I am losing speed with 10 underwater kicks to the guy beside me swimming my speed at water surface....at the end, I am not really trying to use this to become a faster swimmer, I am just trying to learn a new skill and get good conditioning. Maybe this will be my April skill focus. Also on the up stroke, do you push the water "back" with the sole of your feet? I think the answer should be yes

Fly is a little different from free, it isn't simply a flutter kick with both legs moving at the same time. The downstroke serves to lift your hips up and get your torso flat. So you can get away with, maybe even need, to let your legs drop lower.

With the push offs and underwaters, it depends on what you are trying to do. There is an oxygen cost, and you can't just get more whenever you want. The upkick can add speed, but only a bit and it kills your lungs. (well, mine anyway) so I save that for the start and the 50/100. Longer events I'll be a little lazier with it, as the downside to the added speed is more O2 debt. I'll try to get in at least 2 or 3 dolphin kicks regardless of the distance from the 200 and up, more in a sprint.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

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

Make sure you are deep enough as well.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

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

6 mi run w/ 2 x 2 mi 15:53, 15:28
1800 yd swim

5 x 100 on 1:30 w/u, extra :30 after the last one
4 x [200 fast on 3:00 + 100 easy on 2:00] 2:28, 2:26, 2:24, 2:25
100 c/d

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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

Lunch swim - 2100 SCM

300 wu
6 x (
4 x 50 free on :45
50 fly on :60)
300 cd

OK OK....I did the 1000m TT alternating 50 fly 50 free. I'll type up a full report soon. I am bit disappointed with the 18:34 final time. I thought i could hit 18:15 max, but ideally under 18, but I was around 2 seconds slower per 100m than my "target". But there is a big diff between doing 400m of this and 1000m of this and maybe I underestimated how much lactate would build up and the inability to clear it quickly enough between fly segments.

Dude, that's a fantastic effort. I dunno if I would try something like that, and I'm a (former) 200 fly guy....

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

When I was on my 8th fly leg, I was swearing at myself for putting myself through that much self generated pain and I was thinking "who comes up with this shit"....then I saw the time on the clock and said, "never again"....I don't even get a shitty finisher medal for this. Now back at the office, it's more like, "OK, I got to get this thing down to 18 minutes so when do I do it next"...you can't help stupid!

I am thinking that there is 15+ seconds of low hanging fruit simply with more explosive pushes off the wall. If you recall around a year ago, I said that I never pushed off "hard" from the wall because I felt that as an open water tri swimmer, it got me too far down the pool "coasting" that I did not get to do in open water. You encouraged me to do a proper push off and work my streamline because of the carry over to all strokes which I have done...at least the streamline part. The push off the wall is still a bit problematic. Due to my disk/nerve issue, I can't do flip turns, so I do open ended, but on the open ended turn, there is a point where I partially lose control over my left leg before regaining control. I am at the point where this is mild but previously my push off was only with 1 leg (my good right leg). Now I can do it with both legs and I THINK I am not pushing hard enough with my left leg (and thereby not pushing hard with the right either). The open ended turns won't change for a while and I am not messing around right now while I am getting better, but even with my open ended turns, there is some gains to be made. I think I will work this doing the 400m version often and see what things look like.

devashish_paul wrote:

said, "never again"....I don't even get a shitty finisher medal for this!

Sez who??

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

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

I forgot about your nerve damage. If you can't push off hard, then the uw dolphin kicks will be of limited value. They are great at maintaining speed, but you need the speed there to begin with, if that makes sense.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

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

Sweet. You should save the Gold Medal for AnnaS when she obliterates my brief world championships time!

2800 scm this morning...
300 swim
3x100 kick w/fins
4x50 free/fins @ 60 3 strong 1 easy
4x100 free/ fins @ 1:30

Main set
12x75 @ 1:10 (1:05-6/100 pace)
100 easy
8x25 fly with parachute @ 40
100 easy
4x50 @ 50 (under 32)
100 easy

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http://en.wikipedia.org/...eoesophageal_fistula
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cerebral_palsy
2020 National Masters Champion - M40-44 - 400m IM
Canadian Record Holder 35-39M & 40-44M - 200 m Butterfly (LCM)

Jason, I have to thank you for this comment. For a while now I've been struggling to understand why I am perfectly comfortable doing a good dolphin kick off a dive but when pushing off a wall (either a turn or a start) it felt awkward and inefficient. Your comment above popped into my head this morning during a set of fast 25s and bam, instantly felt better doing dolphin kicks off the wall by going a bit deeper. Sometimes it was too deep but I can work on that!

2700 SCM with a pile of all out 25s on 60s. Mix of fly, breast and free.

During your 7:03, did you alternate working more with arms and then rotating down to more leg/core effort to move the oxygen load around, or did you just "swim". On my 1000 I found myself soft stroking with the arms for most of the fly and going harder with the arms on the free and giving the legs/core a bit of a break on the free. I think at times I was down to a 2 beat kick now that I think about it (easy to go from fly to 2 beat since the kick ends up being similar).


I have found that no matter what the sport, it's like the 3rd quarter of an event is mentally the hardest. I don't think it is anything physiological other than the pain creeping up and being too far away from the finish line to "want" to hurt enough (or risking hurting more to keep up the pace). Congrats on your 7:03! I think I need to do more sets with rest (like on 2 minutes) to get the speed up, work my wall push offs (Jason, I was thinking the up side to a weaker wall pushoff is less oxygen utilization). I do think that the 50/50 is great physiological training for pack swimming in a triathlon (or racing a crit on the bike). You have a hard section followed by 'recovery at speed'. In any case, you basically managed to hold 1:46 except for the last one which would be 1:45...that's pretty awesome. One more thing I will add is that due to my spine injuries, I did not risk diving off the blocks, just pushed off the wall. But maybe I can "risk that" now.

3 months to Roth!

You aren't allowed to read any of my stuff. You're getting too fast as it is....

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

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

my endurance kick is kick three times and then I tap my feet together - 80s swimming, we got taught this once

Sounds like a 4-beat to me...

I don't really have a pattern for distance stuff, I just do whatever feels good in the moment. sometimes 2, sometimes, 4, sometimes 6... it's all good.

Out of curiosity, where are you located?

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

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