What does it mean when you say "you've gone before"? Once? a week? a month?

But it sounds like you've gotta suck it up and do it if you want to swim with the leaders. Don't worry about speed vs threshold, just go and do the practices, try to keep up, earn your way up the lane and into the faster lanes.

24 min for .9 (.9 what? miles? you mean 1500m?) That's not even close to cutting it.

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

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

Yeah, one thing to add. One of the biggest benefits to being in a masters program is a of you can find it with a solid coach who has a good amount of technique background... Who will watch you and coach you up.

I'm by no means a fast swimmer, but my 1500 is right about yours when I swim one day a week at 3k, but I swam d3.. When working on technique you need to swim, a lot.

When I was making a stroke change a couple years ago to change my hand position out front, each mini adjustment we made was probably taking 40k of practices to really nail. Swimming 20k a week, I could change something small in a couple weeks. When I am swimming 8k a week, that change takes a lot longer to sink n.

Yeah, get that .9 down to 21 or 21.5 min. sooo 1:20 - 1:25 per 100 METERS open water.


I swam a 1:27 pace last race and I swim one set a week at around 4200 total distance. A lot of it is triathlon specific technique. Breathing every two breaths. Galloping stroke. Sighting. Deck ups. etc...


Ohh, and I just started swimming about 1.5 years ago and didn't hire a coach until less than a year ago. You can do it!

Unless you're FFOP on the bike and run, your swim is not fast enough to race pro. Go to masters, up your swim mileage and focus on getting faster. Are you doing the sport to be more disciplined, faster, and push your body to see how far you can go, or are you doing it for the glory/recognition of racing with "pro" status but finishing in the back of the pack?

Take the anxiety of whether or not you'll qualify for your "pro card" and focus your attention on just getting faster, if you're fast enough to go pro you will get it easily.

Nations Tri Results 2017


See the above link for the swim, bike, and run times of an event that has two really good triathletes (West, Duffy Jr.) and a bunch of middle/back of pack pros. This is where times will need to be...and the pros are only getting faster.

I've been doing tris for about 10 yrs, but really inconsistent training, just doing it because it kept me in shape and so on. The last year I have put more volume in and have seen my ftp and 10k times/watts get really good. I would like to mix it up with the faster guys, test myself. On a local level I am usually top 5 in all the races including just running races. in the past I would do masters twice a week, but like I said I was just inconsistent, maybe go hard for a month or two, get some nice fitness, then take a month off then go back at it. This time around I've just got a renewed mind set and have been working relatively hard for the past 6-8 months ( after taking off a year 2016 sucked, couldnt even run sub 21 5k and weighed a lot.. shit job etc). The one discipline I could do more volume in would be the swim. I think swimming alone all the time is also hurting me. And yea that was my time at St A's the other day. No wetsuit 24.30. 1:30 pace i believe. 1 hour bike 250 watts (170 weight ftp is 330), 38:30 run 6:10 pace, and I was testing my fitness under good volume week, had 8 hours on the bike this week and 34 miles of running and already did 10k yds in the pool(4 sessions about 2500 each). So I came into the race with a tired body. Of course I got 2 massages this week so It wasn't so bad. Last time I went to masters though, I smacked hands with someone almost broke mine. Definitely not something that was positive and made me want to return. 5 Am start is also another reason I'm hesitant. I have read that many triathletes use the volume of their swimming to account for their above threshold work, meaning it counts for some of the work they would normally do on the run or bike. So instead of 3 above threshold runs in a week they only do 1-2 because they are doing the other high HR stuff in the pool.

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Strava:https://www.strava.com/athletes/20890878

It's good that everyone has a dream.

I would assume you are talking about non draft pro racing, I think you have to get within 8% of the winner in a $$ race? Or has that changed?

Anyway it looks to me that you would need to take at least 3 minutes off you swim, a minute+ off your bike, and 2+ minutes off your run to get within range. Of course there might be an easy race somewhere that the winning time is slower, but in general you would need the times I suggested to be able to qualify. That gets you in the door, quite a bit further to go to actually get a check...

St Anthony's

Which guy are you? Just trying to see where you are in the field. I actually raced against some of those names earlier this month.

Monty is correct although here in Ontario you have to show the last 5 results all being within 8% of the winner to get your elite card. Florida and USA Triathlon may have other requirements.

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"Train so you have no regrets @ the finish line"

Great to see that you've got some more consistency in the past few month, but you would would need another few more years of consistent training and luck to be a contender as a pro, even a back of the pack pro.

Your FTP can't be 330 if you only pushed 250 on an oly race. If you're a weak swimmer, you would need to bike AT LEAST 330 for an olympic course at 170lbs, but most likely 350 for a 40k. As a weaker swimmer you'd also need a 10k off the bike of ~32-34 mins to be a solid contender.

Again, my advice is to focus all your attention on getting faster at the moment. Forget the pro license. You need more time + consistency to get there. The perceived fame and recognition of being "pro" status is an illusion to those who pursue it as the end goal.

Yea as I stated I raced with fatigue, its a normal tactic within training, few weeks ago I was at 285 watts for 20 mile race. Back to the original question though. Masters swimming 4-5 days a week - does it make sense for a triathlete trying to push their fitness to the next level? Pros/ cons? if training 16-25 hours a week, no time constraints.

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Strava:https://www.strava.com/athletes/20890878