Flip turn

Definitely something that I do not do on a regular basis and am not good at it but based on the interesting discussion going on today as to reasons for doing it and not doing it I plan to give it a go. I definitely fall under the category of "open turn because I can take my sweet time doing it."

x2

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I noticed a gain when I got to 4 times in the pool per week, and you already said you were doing 5, which is my next goal. And I feel that regular masters sessions helped, by giving me people to try and keep up with. My goal then became to be moved over a lane. Then over another lane.

Unfortunately there are very few masters classes here and the couple that are available don't even come close to working with my schedule.

I'd do things that force you to change your swim stroke.
fast & short, band only, fast pulling, sprinting with fins, swimming with fins, adding drag for shorter repeats, swimming/pulling with fists if you don't catch well or use your forearms

If you're going to use paddles get paddles that help you do the things you don't do well vs jut buying paddles. If you can't figure that out don't buy paddles, at least not right away. Don't buy paddles that are too large like most triathletes.

As a benefit all this drill/technique work will make you fitter where the same isn't going to be said for just doing drills at a slow pace

The tldr: lots of fast, lots of added resistance, lots of band only, lots of fast w/ fins, keep it short(er) keep it fast(ish) don't swim with paddles that are too big for you and don't do what you need corrected

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

1. how much are you swimming per workout? as in, take the last 3 weeks of workouts, divide the number of sessions into the total yards, and then what is the average?

2. what are the 3 longest workouts you've done in the last 3 weeks?

3. what are the 3 longest sets you've done in the last 3 weeks?

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

If you don't have a Masters swim close you can follow our schedule of workouts. Ours are all published on our team calendar. bluetides@jolietpark.org It's better if you have more swimmers and a coach to push you - but at least you can see what we do every day.

Just click on Team Calendar and then on the day and a drop box will show what we are doing. Right now we are in a tapper due to State Meet this weekend. Our team is made up of swimmers and triathletes. We all do basically the same workout just at different speeds.

I hope this helps.

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Dan Kennison

facebook: @triPremierBike
http://www.PremierBike.com
http://www.PositionOneSports.com

Most important thing is to just be consistent. The different sets do develop different things, but some of that is just to introduce variety and stave off boredom.

You've made great progress. Keep on keepin on. If you feel your progress stalling, that's when you take a good look at what to do differently, imo.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

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

I have paddles and even though I don't know a whole lot about swimming I would definitely not say they are too large. I have the square speedo paddles and only use the front finger hole rather than the strap that goes around the wrist as well. When I started this the paddle would instantly slip off my hand telling me something was not correct so I adjusted. I have done bands via the Guppy Challenge but I had not used or heard of it previous to that. Once I started using a band around the ankles I had a major snake movement. From repeated use and adjusting I also seem to have gotten the majority of that worked out. I try to read all of the swimming threads on here that I can to try and pick up bits and pieces from each one then implement that in my own workouts. One thing that helped a bunch I think is during the Guppy Challenge I was swimming with a guy who is a good 5-7 minutes faster than me in a half. Working to keep up with him (not that I could do it) definitely helped. On longer sets I always had a goal to not let him get further than a certain distance from me based on the set length and that pushed me as well.

ETA: I also use fins at some point during 2 of my 4 swims each week. I have some ankle flexibility issues and use this as a way to try and listen them up a bit with kick sets with fans. A 50 kick set usually takes me around 2:15-2:20 to complete.

1. Average workout has been around 3400 yards.

2. 3 longest workouts have been 3500, 3800, and 4000.

3. 3 longest sets have been 2000 yds for the main set. Remainder has been different drills that you had given us in the Guppy Challenge that I am still having some issues with.

Thank you for making this available. As previously stated my training partner that I was swimming with is a fair amount faster than me in the pool and this absolutely helped in trying to even come close to keeping up with him. Outside of him, I swim very early in the mornings so most people that I know are reluctant to join.

that's hefty work. that is plenty. so, noting that you got yourself from 18min to 15min over 1000yd, which is very good, it's certainly not volume that is keeping you from getting to 14min, and faster.

what drills are you having trouble with?

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

that's all good.

It's not volume that's holding you back.

What it sounds like you need are a few things:

1. get some video of your stroke to someone who knows what they are doing & have them analyze it finding the 2 or 3 worst flaws. Not all the flaws just the biggest 2-3 flaws.
2. you/them figure out which 2-3 big technique changes you need to implement. Fix those first, which will often fix other things
3. figure out which drills can facilitate these changes
4. figure out how to use band only/fins/pull buoy/paddles etc to help facilitate these changes. Some paddles are good for extension, some are good for making sure your hand position is more correct, some work better for using your forearms, some don't do a lot of things well, some are good for producing power and nothing else.
5. using a snorkel allows you to look at what you're hands are doing a lot easier than no snorkel. Use a snorkel.

And remember it's always drill then swim to help facilitate the change.

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

The main thing is the one arm drills. I can do them and have gotten a lot more comfortable with them but I still feel a pretty good stall when I breath during this drill and especially when doing them with the right arm and breathing on the right side as typically breathe on the left side. A couple of other things I have noticed as i get further into a set and fatigue a bit is
1. My right arm tends to work in towards the center line and gets closer to crossing over.
2. My elbows start to drop a bit more rather than keeping them close to the surface.
3. I have a slight hitch at the back end my stroke with my right arm. I think it is due to my rotation being off and slowing a bit when I breathe but I am not positive on that.
Again this is a self diagnosis from an AOS so it may or may not be an issue.

I am going to take a shot at this and say that if he swims for a month doing every set of every workout with the 3 hole inner tube band (the version that allows you to maintain a tight kick), he takes another 30 seconds off the 15:00. Maybe more. Most of the slowness of us triathletes is our drag coupled with slow cadence.....bad drag with stalls in propulsion are speed killers. Keeping it tight and narrow, less drag and easier to get the cadence up since you don't have that massive stall phase.

as dev pointed out, swimming with banded ankles unmasks a lot of sins. banded ankles that are FLOATED by a buoy. whatever you do that pulls you offline, whether with your pull, your kick, your body position, is found out when you don't have the stabilizing, countering offsets you do with your legs. the trick is to not have to offset anything with your legs.

if you don't have these implements yet, i would acquire a symmetric snorkel and something to band your ankles with. i'd be interested in seeing you review a few methods of banding your ankles, see what you like best.

i think if you fairly routinely swim 200yd with a snorkel, just freestyle, and then another 200 yards with banded ankles (so that they don't/can't kick at all) i think this will pay some dividends. you don't need to swim any of this fast. just focus on getting it right. making the changes you need to make so that you don't fishtail in the water. so that the tops of your feet are pretty much always pointed to the bottom of the pool.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

x2 on what Brian said about the band, paddles, fist, etc. It doesn't seem like conditioning is the problem. Did you try possibly shortening up your sets (tightening up the interval)? It may not be following a typical masters program but you may want to do some pace 25s and 50s on short rest (but not all-out pace). Once your technique improves you may be able to add some drag in there. Just my thought.

Hi LSchmitt,

Swimming I'm sure you know is very technique centric more so than the bike and the run leg in my opinion. To increase your speed in whatever distance, say the half, is to basically train for the half. If you haven't trained for that distance before, it will be advisable to get a coach to train you specifically for that. Your coach might peel it back down and go back to the basics, as often, athletes have have accumulated bad habits as they have continued swimming through the years. You might need to slightly change your technique. And of course your training load will be an important factor too. However, training consistently with the wrong technique will be counter-productive.

Your coach, if they are exposed to triathlon swimming in the open water, will train you in drafting, navigating, etc. You will be surprised, this will save you a ton of time, add this to the time saved in effective pool training.

Good Luck!

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An age group triathlete just like you.
TopTriGear - https://www.toptrigear.com

When you first had us do the drills with banded ankles to minimize and control the kick I instantly noticed one leg would flail out. This seems to be somewhat under control but I still go back to it at least once a week to make sure I have not reintroduced the habit. I have a symmetric snorkel as well. I will incorporate this some more and switch with the band as well as you and dev have both mentioned. I did some video per your request during the challenge but plan to do another one in a week or two from some different angles and try to get some more input from the wisdom here. The one banding that I have not tried of the methods I know of is using the inflated wheel barrow tube so I may pick one of those up this weekend and try that as well.

I have tightened up the intervals some as my swimming has improved. My first race is in 8 weeks so I am hoping to see a big difference in where I get out of the water in relation to the front versus previous years. I think continuing to shorten the intervals as I improve is a must so I continue to push myself.

Fortunately or unfortunately i do know swimming is very technique centric. I just never really cared until now since swimming is one of the big things I am lacking on now to compete with the people I race against most of the time. I have trained for the half distance before but am certainly not an expert at it. Thank you for the advice. I don't know how many people are interested but I am planning to report back after race day as to how the 8 weeks went and how the swim dynamics for the race were.