Well, one of the first things to do is to get in the habit of watching the clock for every single thing you do in the pool. I mean everything, warmup, drills, kick sets, every repeat of main set, recovery swim, everything. You should have a really solid idea of your pacing, then you'll br able to instantly gauge the effectiveness of even minor changes.

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

Am also curious to hear what you think being a hard worker in the pool is, specifically volume per week sustained over time. I made huge progress from exactly your pace this year, after nearly 2 years of a total plateau, and for me the solution wasn't a magic technique fix, but just cranking out literally double my swim volume (8-10k/wk became 20-25k/wk) with a combo of pool + vasa, and in fact a lot more vasa than pool. My form is farrrrr from perfect and still has some obvious flaws when I self video, but honestly, they weren't the reason I wasn't swimming a lot faster - it was lack of power and turnover.

Last year I was your speed, 100yds in 1:30ish max all-out for 100. I do that pace now for 4000yds no problem. And this progress was almost entirely volume related; I didn't spend enough time in the pool (most yards done on a Vasa) to naturally pick up subtle technique refinements that would account for this increase. It's also really obvious too if you compare me to lanemates in the masters group I sporadically swim with - my stroke turnover rate specifically is now equal to those guys who previously killed me but now I'm equaling.

Just cautioning to not underestimate the importance of power/endurance for us MOPers; I think the pitfall of most plateaued BOMOP swimmers like my prior self was listening to well-meaning fish who say it's all technique and thus attribute our lack of speed mainly to some errant technique error, when in reality, the far bigger component that differentiates a 1:20MOP swimmer from a 1:45MOP swimmer is power/endurance. You can literally put a T-shirt and baggy shorts on me or other 1:20 swimmers, or even band one of our arms to our side, and we'll still beat that 1:45 pace swimmer, which makes it hard for me to believe that some subtle stroke error or tiny body position difference is costing 20sec/100 given that we can beat them even with a massive form penalty.

(I wouldn't give this advice to raw beginners; they should forget the power and just do technique work, as those folks, often slower than 2:00/100, do in fact have fatal speed-killing flaws that do cost 20sec/100. I don't think you fit in this category though.)

If I had to do it again, i would have saved a lot of time by just being aware of the EVF motion, but not compromising any volume or intensity to improve it, and just try and emphasize its motion during actual sets; unlike those form-killing beginner errors which are readiliy fixed with no hard swimming, there's a reason why all the guys with powerful EVF have either swum or are swimming big volume,usually ex-competitive swimmers.

Crap. I'm exposed now, lol.

Yeah, I don't swim enough. 2x 45' a week currently. I'm in my fourth class of Masters and that is a step in the right direction for me.

I keep thinking of coaches and pros that say "you have to be swimming each session for purpose: be it a speed workout, endurance, power, or technique." Well, I don't quite have an answer for that. I just grind out 20x100s or swim for 45' as often as I can. I do follow a training plan during the season which gives my swim workouts much more structure.

Thanks for the volume insight though. I guess I should step it up to 3-4x/wk. in order to see real improvement.

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Madison photographer Timothy Hughes | Instagram

Honestly, that's kind of what I expected. You still have clearly more talent (a lot more, actually) than me, as I could only swim that fast after 4x45' per week, and I was going almost as hard as possible on every one of those sessions of 100s 200s, almost no easy yards in there when I was doing that.

Again, from coming from where you are now, I'd advise to focus more on significant volume increases than obsessing over EVF details. I seriously doubt you'll even gain 1sec/100 by trying to refine your stroke at this point without the volume and power training to reinforce it correctly. You swimming 4-5x/wk at 45' per swim and with zero stroke refinement will crush your current self at 2 x 45' per week with extensive stroke refinement, at any distance.

I'm def no expert, but at our level, I don't think you need some laser focus of goals for each swim workout. At the FFOP and elite levels, that makes a ton of sense - elite swimmers lose races by 0.1sec, so even a misstep on a flip turn or tiny stroke error will make or break. At our levels, we simply don't swim enough volume or hard enough to warrant that kind of focus - just gotta get out and suffer. I really think at our MOP level, too many people overthink it, and too many fish with obvious innate physical and technical talent, give bad advice because they can't even comprehend what it is to be stuck at slower than 1:30/100 pace for years, even swimming 1x/wk.

(I apparently was a gifted youth musician, went to Juilliard, #1 ranking pretty much everywhere I played, etc., and I would have been the WORST person to give advice to for joe-average musicians. For compatriots at Juilliard, i could give great advice, but without the talent and ability innately, that advice is useless, and possibly destructive to average folks. In particular, I could take a lot of practice shortcuts that would utterly fail for the average musician - I didn't appreciate this until literally watching 20 years of other people fail at it before I accepted that I probably had natural ability. Now it's stunningly obvious in retrospect.)

Gratuitous bump of thread thanks to great video and discussion.

I'm certainly in agreement about getting in more swim time in for MOP/BOP swimmers. I think the biggest mistake that newer triathletes make is only swimming 2x week and not having any regular feedback on their technique. It could be a Master's or triathlete-specific swim course so long as it is run by a talented and motivated coach. I remember my tri coach, who only did duathlons and didn't think the swim was important, would only schedule 2x a week until I realized that it wasn't enough based on my slow improvement. It was my first year racing and I needed to swim more. I increased to 3x a week of my own accord and signed up for a worthless swim course with the city, but by then it was too late to make any significant gains before my big late summer race. This was a mistake but I've grown older and wiser.