3 month swim focus- Modest improvement

Triathlon Forum
1

I read a suggestion from Dev back in January that 50x50 on 0:50 SCY was a great swim strength workout, so I decided to give it a try.
My base swim had been 2500 SCY 3 times a week, just sort of whatever I wanted to do.

Swim Focus:
Swim 5x/week (M-Fr)
Started with 50x50 on 0:50, couldn’t complete it
Eventually got to where I was coming in about 0:41-0:42 consistently
Added yardage 60x50, then 70x50
Started alternating days 70x50 then 35x100 (100s coming in 1:22-1:24, leave on 1:45)
Maxed out at 4000 SCY/day x5 days, so 20,000 yards last week (week 13)
100% hard. No warmups or cooldowns

Results:
Pre: I did not test beforehand, but a very hard 1000 SCY time would be right at 15:00 (1:30/100scy). I might have done 14:40 during peak training once
Post: 14:20 for 1000 SCY (1:26/100)

My Thoughts:
I was hoping to go 14:00 to 14:10
I got stronger (back muscles looking more like a swimmer)
I think my stroke improved. Swimming shorter distances on short rest makes every stroke vital to making your intervals, so there is a lot of focus on hand entry, rotation, optimal glide, staying quiet in the water, correcting errors that crop up when fatiguing (like fish tailing and bouncing in the water)
I probably need weeks or months at 20,000 SCY/week to ingrain/sustain, and possibly continue to improve
I probably have some stroke issues that could/should be addressed that I may not be recognizing, that are limiting me from getting to 1:15 or 1:20/100scy for those short intervals. I do think that my goal of 14:00-14:10 might be do-able with a month or 2 or this higher volume
Not sure how this is going to transfer to a race

Background/Frame of Reference:
2 years of swim team early in life (1 year in grade school, 1 year in high school)
58 years old
10 years in triathlon, primarily long course, 26 IM distance
~1:06 IM distance swim with wetsuit (~1:34/100 scy)

Conclusions/Thoughts:
Currently, more than doubling my swim time (from <3 hours to nearly 6) has improved my projected IM swim by ~3min…maybe more in 6 months. Not very efficient, as has been discussed on Slowtwitch multiple times.
If I wanted to recommit (not sure I want to), where do I go from here?

Paul

2

Is there any particular reason you are taking 20+ seconds rest for 100’s? Seems like an inordinate amount of time to sit on the wall. Just curious the reasoning behind it or what you can glean from taking that much rest with respect to what kind of pace you can hold for a distance swim.

I bring this up not to be a pest, but you are already swimming a nice chunk of yardage. Not so sure you need to swim more or harder at the moment from what I read. I do question what you are getting out of 100’s with that much rest though…maybe there is some gravy in those stacks of 100’s if you can sustain a pace for 35x with 10 seconds or less rest? Boy when you can whittle down your send off to 10 you will gain a lot of confidence and by the time you get to 5 seconds rest there is no question you can sustain that pace.

Good luck enjoy your swimming it’s like the Mafia…for life!

Edit: I know it’s been said a million times here, but if you have the means to swim with a group/Masters all these little nuances of training will be taken care of for ya…likely to get much more out of a few Masters workouts a week than 5 or more on your own not on the right stuff.

3

Yeah I agree the rest interval on the 100s seems long. And I think you could probably swim those 50s at 1:15 scy, but not 50 of them :wink: So why not do 30 of them, and take a bit more rest on the 50s? It seems like you’re trying to do your 50s on very little rest, and the 100s on alot of rest, which to me is counterintuitive. I do 50s for speed, 100s and longer for threshold stuff. Both are hard, but in their own way. Also, why no warmup/cooldown?

4

50x50 on :50 at what intensity? I’ve done this set, but every rep was off the blocks, sprinting. 50x50s on :50 easy would be just boring.

5

Do you have a local masters group near you? My opinion is that if you swam more varied workouts, took less rest between intervals, and had someone put together a more holistic program, your progress would have been way better. Sure 50 50’s on 50 sounds good. But you’re not the 50s-swim-Cowboy. Your goal is getting to T1 faster, and a group could really help you.

6

Have you actually seen what your stroke looks like to see where there may be some low hanging fruit from a technique perspective?

It’s one thing to FEEL like your hand entry, extension, rotation, catch, pull, finish, body position are all good.

It’s another thing to actually SEE that it’s all good…

7

I have some comments, some will back up what you’ve already read, some will be different (and counter to popular ideas - a different perspective, you could say)

first, good that you took up the challenge - even from Dev :slight_smile: .

good coaching will likely be helpful. I’ve had some (years ago) now I do the next best thing and let the clock teach me if what I’m doing is right or wrong. Turns out (by luck) I’m sensitive to the water so, I can get away with that. Seek and find a coach is my advice.

Re: 1,000yd time trials - they are excellent, but, you need to do a few (in a rested state) to trust what your real time is: The first one or so, you won’t have the pace nailed - as a side benefit you’ll get a good workout at the same time. So, politely - your time for 1,000 may be quite soft.

Re: Warmups - wow! I can’t speak for anybody else - but I don’t actually have decent feeling (or split times) until at least 500 yds (usually closer to 1,000), especially for sprints like 50’s and 100’s - so, do at minimum a 2 stage warmup. like: “easy” for 300, medium for 300, etc.)

As I’ve stated (like a broken record - I’m gonna get in trouble now) in other threads - if you’re doing 50’s or 100’s make them count - go fast. in order to do that you need lotsa rest. Typical for me; 50’s I’ll finish, wait ~20 seconds do an easy (real easy) 50 then wait another 25ish seconds. I expect the times to be near 30 seconds (not bad for AOS 54 year old, triathlete). for 100’s similar concept I do a dozen on 2:05 expecting to come in between 67 and 76ish.

I don’t bother with short rest intervals - I’ll just do a 1,000 or 1,650 or 2,000 time trial (hard as possible). I already have cardio fitness from running and cycling, so I swim for two reasons - to go fast and/or recovery. I never swim for fitness (that’s why I don’t like many masters programs), I’ll get some fitness as a beneficial byproduct of swimming. But, all I care about doing as little as possible to go as fast as possible. (BDB, but usually first out of the water in AG - is good enough for me). on less than 10,000yds/week.

enjoy the journey - Rome wasn’t built in a day

8

I’m caffeine free at the moment so maybe I missed something.

Did you always do 50x50 then progress to whatever x 50 or 35x100’s for your workouts ?

Did you mix in 100’s, 200’s, 400,s 500’s?

Did you do any other swimming, swimming with fins, pulling with paddles etc that would force you to change your stroke to a more economical stroke?

I’d also suggest that just looking at swim times is short sighted. Another benefit will be when you race and exit the water. Sure you’ll be faster which is never a bad thing. The other benefit is that faster time will take less out of you than the slower time used to take out of you allowing you to go faster for the rest of the race.

I think if it were me, I might drop back to 4-5h of swimming per week, mix in other distances, mix in things that force me to become more economical. I’d strongly consider joining a masters program as well.

9

Simply put, you probably need to look to your stroke for improvement.

You have fitness, improvement from there always comes back to stroke.
If you have strength it is only wasted if you haven’t the stroke efficiency.
The improvement you are looking for is less than half a second a length.
Efficiency in the water will give you that.
(I can’t think of any other cliches)

Of course you could post a video, we love videos :0)

10

I agree with Brian (“desert dude”) that you might have improved more if you had done some sets of 200s, 300s, 400s, and 500s to give yourself a better feel for holding pace for a longer swim. Also, as “man of the woods” points out, it might be better to do a 1000 TT more often to give yourself more experience with holding a strong pace for 1000 yd. I would tend to agree that your improvement was not as great as I would’ve hoped but, if you can keep swimming 4-5 hr/wk, and vary those workouts a bit more, in another 3 months you might be able to drop down from 14:20 to 13:40, maybe even 13:20 (1:20/100 yd), i.e., you might be just on the edge of a bigger breakthrough. I would not give up quite yet:)

11

I have some comments, some will back up what you’ve already read, some will be different (and counter to popular ideas - a different perspective, you could say)

first, good that you took up the challenge - even from Dev :slight_smile: .

good coaching will likely be helpful. I’ve had some (years ago) now I do the next best thing and let the clock teach me if what I’m doing is right or wrong. Turns out (by luck) I’m sensitive to the water so, I can get away with that. Seek and find a coach is my advice.

Re: 1,000yd time trials - they are excellent, but, you need to do a few (in a rested state) to trust what your real time is: The first one or so, you won’t have the pace nailed - as a side benefit you’ll get a good workout at the same time. So, politely - your time for 1,000 may be quite soft.

Re: Warmups - wow! I can’t speak for anybody else - but I don’t actually have decent feeling (or split times) until at least 500 yds (usually closer to 1,000), especially for sprints like 50’s and 100’s - so, do at minimum a 2 stage warmup. like: “easy” for 300, medium for 300, etc.)

As I’ve stated (like a broken record - I’m gonna get in trouble now) in other threads - if you’re doing 50’s or 100’s make them count - go fast. in order to do that you need lotsa rest. Typical for me; 50’s I’ll finish, wait ~20 seconds do an easy (real easy) 50 then wait another 25ish seconds. I expect the times to be near 30 seconds (not bad for AOS 54 year old, triathlete). for 100’s similar concept I do a dozen on 2:05 expecting to come in between 67 and 76ish.

I don’t bother with short rest intervals - I’ll just do a 1,000 or 1,650 or 2,000 time trial (hard as possible). I already have cardio fitness from running and cycling, so I swim for two reasons - to go fast and/or recovery. I never swim for fitness (that’s why I don’t like many masters programs), I’ll get some fitness as a beneficial byproduct of swimming. But, all I care about doing as little as possible to go as fast as possible. (BDB, but usually first out of the water in AG - is good enough for me). on less than 10,000yds/week.

enjoy the journey - Rome wasn’t built in a day

How did I get blamed for the 50x50 on 50? I’ve never done that workout in recent memory. I have done that running 50x200m departing on 50 seconds so a few seconds rest in between each and it’s basically doing a 40 min 10K of running with a rest every 200m…great foot speed workout with just enough rest that it does not feel that bad if you are in sub 40 min 10K shape.

Now that I think of it, it might be a decent cross training workout to get the cardio ready for a 10K running race! Maybe a different version of my 20x55 seconds at 110-120% FTP wtih 5 second rest, but you get the picture.

OK back on topic of swimming, I guess I’ll go give it a shot since I did not do it the day I turned 50!!! My original plan was to do it running (50x200m on 50 seconds), but right around then I started to have some nerve related problems from a 2011 crash and basically both walking and running have been a right off since then. In the mean time, I am on the 90000m per month swimming plan (since I need to get fitness from somewhere and I am not getting it from running).

12

You’re on the right track although you overdid it on the yardage (you could have done about 25% less and seen a bigger gain) and your interval was too tight on the 50s - again it should be in the neighborhood of 20 seconds. Warm up and warm down are integral to improving, so you can work on that too. The interval on the 100s was spot on. Don’t worry about doing anything longer than a 100. Stay focused on your technique at pace.

At 58, if you are really looking to make some big gains in the water then it would have to include time in the weight room and you’d find that that time was well spent. It would help your bike and run too.

If you have any specific questions, ask away. I am happy to help.

Best regards,

Tim Floyd

13

You’re on the right track although you overdid it on the yardage (you could have done about 25% less and seen a bigger gain) and your interval was too tight on the 50s - again it should be in the neighborhood of 20 seconds. Warm up and warm down are integral to improving, so you can work on that too. The interval on the 100s was spot on. Don’t worry about doing anything longer than a 100. Stay focused on your technique at pace.

At 58, if you are really looking to make some big gains in the water then it would have to include time in the weight room and you’d find that that time was well spent. It would help your bike and run too.

If you have any specific questions, ask away. I am happy to help.

Best regards,

Tim Floyd

Him Tim I always enjoy reading your input. I’m interested to hear you expound on rest for 100’s when training for distance swims. Can you expound on what kind of rest you advise for a given set please? Maybe this is where my bRaiN is stuck in threshold mode and long rests such as 20+ seconds were on say a 300 historically. Always looking to learn more and greatly value your posts thanks. Been out of the water most of the last 10 months and finally see a window starting next month where I can get back to regular swims…starting from scratch again maybe I will adjust some!

14

Dev,
Sorry to blame you for that one…I looked up the original post from back in mid January:

(One of our guys turned 50 so he got to pick a workout) We did an interesting main set at Masters this morning that I thought I would share. 50 X 50 yds on the :50. It was a great set for building strength. Seems like we had about 7 seconds between laps which was plenty.

If your looking get stronger - this is a great set for it.

Dan Kenniosn

Thanks for all the comments. The beauty of this workout for me is the simplicity. I know what I’m doing, and it doesn’t require much thought.
I think one of my limiters has been upper body strength, so I figured this would help with speed and strength, and it has to some extent. Still debating where to go from here.

15

Focus on swim technique and reducing drag over gaining strength or power.

16

Always great to read your swimming posts. I started swimming at ~16 from no background, now I’m 18 and swim around 13:00 for 1000scy off of consistent 12-16k/week (typically bike 6-9h/week and run 20-35mi as well). I’ve done a few blocks of 25-30k/week.

Would you mind sharing some of your weight room stuff? I would really like to know how to improve my swimming further. Obviously, swim with better quality, but in terms of no stone unturned, Id like to know what to do in the gym as well!

17

As a counterpoint to the above, if you were indeed plateaud at 1:30 pace with your prior training (sounds like you were), a gain of 4-6 sec/100 for 3 months of swim focus at 20k/wk seems totally legit in terms of pace improvement for a 1000TT. I’d be pretty happy with that kind of improvement for 3 months, in terms of breaking through a swim speed plateau. (That’s pretty much the exact kind of swim bump in speed I see on my swim blocks.)

18

Glad you enjoy the posts.

The sets that I have had the most success with are modeled after ideas talked about by Dave Salo since the early 1980s and by some of the ideas coming out of USRPT. I’ve interpreted those ideas and with my own experience as a coach modified them to fit into a triathlon framework.

Based on the work done by Rushall (USRPT) the sets he outlines have 20 seconds of rest. The more important point is that the set is being driven by the “hold pace” that the coach gives and not dictated by the interval. The interval is dependent on what the “hold pace” is for the swimmer for that given set. For example, if I was constructing a set for the OP based on what he has given us in terms of age, experience, goals etc…he wouldn’t have started out with 50x50 with 5-7 seconds rest. Yeah, he got in 2500 yards, but with that little rest the stroke was breaking down and he was just grinding through it. The 20 second rest interval gives you enough rest to recover and hold your stroke together to go hard for the next effort. I would have started this athlete off with 20x50 swim @ 1:00 (hold 38) or probably more likely 40x25 swim @ 35 (hold 17/18). There would have been a lot of focus on technique at speed. The last thing you want to do is swim slow. Swimming the triathlon coach swim workout of 10x400s will make you slower. No one can hold 10x400 with great technique at a very high intensity workout after workout; it will not happen. So all you are doing is ingraining slow, sloppy, inefficient technique into your “kinetic chain.” With the limited amount of time triathletes are in the water training it becomes much less about focusing on the “metabolics” and more about training the “kinetic chain,” biomechanics, movement of the athlete in the water at the speed they want to swim. The most efficient way to develop a complex new skill like a swim stroke is to push yourself to the edge of your limits, make a mistake, correct the mistake and then go back to pushing yourself to the edge of your limits.

I hope this helps and if you have any other questions, let me know.

Tim

19

I’ve been working with a company called Bridge Athletics. The founder of the company is an ex-swimmer that was the strength and conditioning coach at Cal Berkeley for about 12 years. He worked with a lot of Olympic swimmers. He’s developed a fantastic program that he delivers on a very slick and easy to use app. The program is customizable and he’s working with a couple of the pros that I coach to develop an Ironman specific weight lifting program.

I started out using the program myself about 9 months ago as a “guinea pig” and it is the most “connected” I’ve felt in the water since I swam in college and I am not swimming any where near that amount of yardage. The initial results from the pros and Agers on my team have been impressive so far.

If you are interested in checking out the program I have a discount code to get you a month for free. PM me if you want to use the program.

Tim

Also, you should think about dropping in to swim with the team here in the Woodlands. We could definitely get you faster.

20

I actually think you are probably right…4% time decrease may be reasonable given the effort. I really suspect that I would need to put in 2-3 more months of similar effort to get to sub 1:25/100scy over 1000 distance.

Based on input from others posting here, I am trying a new workout:
300 warmup
20x100scy come in ~1:22, leave on 1:45
20x50scy come in on 0:38, leave on 1:00
200 cooldown

More rest on my 50s (previously leaving on 0:50) has decreased my 50 time from 0:42 to 0:38

Also, lifted weights today…