ericmulk wrote:
As a life-long swimmer, I would not say that swimming is a "technical discipline" per se, and i certainly wouldn't compare it to playing the violin. Swimming is an upper-body (UB) strength/power/endurance sport and the problem that some lower body (LB) sport guys have is that their UB is just not as strong as their LB. Also, you have to have some degree of coordination to swim well which can also sometimes be a problem for some people, but swimming does not have the eye-hand coordination requirements of say tennis or baseball. While it will sound like a broken record to those who've read my swim posts in the past, i will for about the 40th time point out that right here on ST our own klehner started swimming at age 26 and yet went 51.0 for 100 scy at age 28; mikenultra is around 40 and has gone 50.X for 100 scy and is training to break 50 at age 40; lightheir has gone from swimming 2:15/100 for the 100 yd TT to swimming 1:20/100. In my own masters swimming experience, i've known several USMS swimmers who went low 50s for 100 scy despite not starting swimming until their late 20s or even 30s, but none of them could run very well:)
In sum, there is a definite genetic component to any given sport and the best tri guys are those who have been lucky enough to inherit great skills in all three sports, and of course who have the hunger and the drive to fully develop these talents. I would venture to say that it is more a lack of swim-specific talent that holds back adult-onset swimmers, rather than the fact of starting as an adult.
Have to say I disagree with this for the most part.
If we just break down your post into its constituent components I think that becomes evident. On the one hand you reference people on this forum, 'Klehner', 'Mikenultra', 'Lightheir' in order to demonstrate how it's possible to make huge improvements, and then you attribute this in part to their genetics and swim-specific talent (of course combined with hard work no doubt).
As you indicate these people have been knocking off swathes of time in events as short as the 100! Some of them have been taking over 20, 30 seconds off their time. Imagine what that would translate to over the course of an 1.5k olympic swim.
The utterly huge difference in ITU racing is that everyone is racing at the finest of margins. Forget about trying to take 20 seconds off your 100m time, try taking 20 seconds off your 1500 time. That's the difference between making the front pack and making the chasing pack. Time and time again, that's the difference which separates Mola and Murray from Brownlee and Gomez.
Of course if you take an age-group swimmer who's never really swam before, teach them the techniques of swimming, train up their swimming related cardiovascular fitness you'll see a huge improvement in their 100m time from year 1 to year 2. But that's a world away compared to ITU racing.
When you're at the finest of margins being able to take 2 seconds of your hundred whilst you're out there getting smashed in the face, having to close down a gap as you go round the buoy is what it's all about. And a huge part of that definitely comes from starting out swimming when you're five years old and just developing it over a decade whilst you're still in your youth and receptive to that transformative process.