Ah, I see now, this makes sense. As you can prob guess, I’ve never used any of the Garmin or similar watches, just go off the old pace clock. 
Could it be head position bringing the legs down? Not getting enough glide in your stroke (wetsuit limiting shoulder flexibility)? I’m with Monty and have found that on pool sets from 1500m-2000m of 100s/200s/400s, my “best average” pace for these sets comes out very close to my 70.3 and IM swims where wetsuits are allowed.
Do you have a watch- recorded pool swim for which you might share the data? For example, what’s your stroke rate in the pool?
Let’s also add, that there are probaly more races in triathlon that aren’t properly marked correctly for distance, than there are imo. So then again comparing pace to the 2 really is almost irrelevant. Obviously the bigger the profile races the more likely it’s as accurate as can be, but when we are talking about overall, comparing pace from the 2 is almost non-sensical, what the “pace” is or isn’t is almost irrelevant.
Do you think Javier Gomez or LCB worry about what their actual pace is in a race compared to the pool pace? They’d 100% laugh in your face with the question. It doesn’t matter.
Did you recently change your profile pic from a man in a red and white shirt?
I don’t remember ever having that on the old site (I think just your name was on the user profile on posts + any signature you added), and when the new site it just auto generated, and I figure, if 99% of people don’t use a profile pic, why should I. It took me this long to realize how to change it. I kept seeing all these people with L or R or whatever and so few had profile pics, figure what the hell.
I don’t know why they took out the signature ability either, I guess to clean it up and no linky’s to click on, etc? Again I’m not tech savy at all.
I’m a 78 year old tech savy-wise trapped in a 43 year old body. I’m tech stupid.
I think they would worry if they noticed that are finishing behind competitors that they know, or feel they know, they are faster than in the pool. Maybe not a comparison of their own 1:xx/100m pool time vs 1:xx/100m OW time, but at least a “why am I comparatively slower in OW, than the pool?” internal examination.
Also, I think AG racers, for the majority at least, are racing an individual “time trial” effort and less head-to-head like the pros.
Comparing a 1:40-2:00/100m swimmer to JG and LCB is a stretch though. I wonder if BOP (in the swim) pros looks at and compares their pool times to OW times?
Yes and as I said, the answer is almost certainly going to be found in how he swam that 4k straight swim. If he’s saying he did 400’s in the pool on 1:45m pace, and adding rest every 7 mins. I can almost gurantee you his swim splits for that 4k straight swim were starting in the 1:4x and finishing in the 2:0x to have an avg of 1:56. So when you are comparing what you did in 400’s to suddenly a 4k straight swim, even with a wetsuit, is going to then sorta imo be overthinking. He even said in Kona he’s a 1:10, so yes he’s now suddenly slower with a wetsuit, but in what capacity are we really looking at. This was a solo swim effort, what type of workout was it even for him. So yes I think it’s kinda “over thinking it” and so I def think trying to compare times between the 2 venues isn’t really a 1-1 equal comparision.
So again I’m guessing look at the splits within the swim and it’ll show he simply slowed down way more than he thought he would.
Of course wetsuits will help you and are faster than without one in an ow envionment. But the simple fact of wearing one doesn’t automatically make you faster than in the pool, for various course reasons. Are we really arguing that? I’ve said that because the 2 environments are so vastly different, that in general it’s not really best practice to “compare” the 2 paces to each other because each has such different variables that can affect it. So yes I think it’s “overthinking it” imo if your only taking pool pace vs ow pace.
So in the OP’s instance, imo he’s incorrectly applying pace comparisons between 2 workouts that don’t make a lot of sense to compare too in my “coach” opinion. Which is why I said- look at the individual splits and it’s going to be pretty easy to see- he likely fell off at some point in the swim. There is zero chance he swam 4k straight at 1:56 exact/same pace.
I’ve read monty write a 1k times on this very site, the best way to compare times from an open water setting is not in the actual time or the actual pace split, but to the “known swimmers” times and then the gaps to that. Lots of races out there don’t even use the most accurate of accurate measures to even measure the courses, so that time doesn’t even mean anything. Now obviously in this OP we are talking about a swim practice event, so that’s not really applicable. But the same principles still apply. We have no clue how much chop it was, how much current it was, and then we are comparing a 400m swim paces to a 4k straight swim and we are wondering why they may be different? That’s the definition of over-thinking it, is it not? So if you suddenly see you held pace for 1200m and then dropped 5s the next 1200m and then the final 1500m dropped even more time, you know what you need to do for your training.
So no your not just “automatically” faster in a wetsuit compared to your pool times, when you add in all the real world variables that each of the 2 swim bodies have on that split. You can be, and you may not be and it have not real differences other than the actual variables in the OW that affect said time, and you can still be basically the same swimmer. See all those athletes who don’t have PR’s in the ow (who have used wetsuits on super accurate courses) vs their PR’s being from the pool.
I’m kinda confused on how this is kinda even up for debate, but monty would argue the other side on anything I ever say on this site…it’s a bit wild.
We should have an open turn appreciation thread. How do you do it? One hand touch, and tuck your legs up, does the arm come out of the water or both arms under water?
The worst thing I see is the open turn where the person puts their hand on top of the ledge, pulls themselves up and then goes again.
I’m all for a well done open turn but not like that, not like that sweet jesus
I’ve been doing some open turns recently when I am in SCM
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It’s all relative. If you swim 140 -200 when you’re 85 years old you’re going to shred your age group like a Metallica guitar solo
Can you answer these questions
Have you even went to an open water area with bouy athe exact 100 m distance away for rowing to test ???
Is your stoke rate in the pool always that low 66 strokes per min .
Do you trust the garmin in open water ?? I never have .
Do you do full stops to sight or sight during stoke.
Do you finish x race in front of x swimmer that you also beat in the pool ?
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66 strokes per minute could be fine for this swimmer. An arbitrary high or low stroke is not necessary to swim well.
If you swim and sight in a pool to check the time, however you do your sighting technique, versus swim without sighting - swimming without sighting is quicker.
What do you mean trust the game?
I used to get beaten by people I could beat in the pool. I can beat them now. I changed my training to work on holding pace over 800 plus in the pool, so I know what stroke I need to do and I built up my strength. I am now much much slower over a 100 than I have ever been but much much faster over a 2-3.5km.
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These questions were for the thread poster?
I ment garmin not game , autocorrect?
Yep I’m just interested in this topic as I am now trying to put my finger on what makes a good and over performing ow swimmer versus a pool swimmer. In cycling resiliency is referred to and not total watts. This may have some relevance to this equation
I mean by default it’s going to come down to your swim experience. The better swimmer you are in the pool, *generally you are going to then do well in the open water with holding pace, not being overwhelmed, etc. Of course there is always that “I’m a better ow swimmer than pool swimmer” so dont @ me on n = 1 examples.
So start there. If your asking what makes an adult onset swimmer be as good (or better) in ow than pool, I would guess “swim comfort” is a key indicator because ow is such an different environment. I would also guess said pool swimming ability is just not as refined.
Before Rio, the US brought in Alan Webb (the incredible Olympic runner) to try itu. That dude was swimming with Eli Hemming every swim (who was generally a FOP back end swimmer). He’d touch the wall with him on quality pool sets, but you put them in OW and suddenly Webb couldn’t even make the main chase group, and his “ringer” days were over very quickly in ITU.
Yes well I think the topic is not necessarily straight forward, but its not rocket science either.
I want to give you an example of why this is not a straight forward issue. I am not trying to n equals 1 just showing its not as straightforward ias it may seem at first
One of the most “experienced” swimmers I know swam at a few olympics, WR holder, won medals at big comps. He is not as good in the OW as other swimmers who were just surf and OW swimmers at a local and state level. He is faster in the pool in SCM, and faster over a 400m in the pool LCM as well. But over a 2-4km OW swims, he is getting dusted by 60 year olds.
Right but in most training principles, I think it just makes it more complicated when you add in “n=1” to somehow try and come away with some gotcha moments. Like for the most part, the better you are in the pool with all things swimming- flip turns, breath control, etc is going to have a much bigger impact on your ow swimming than almost anything else because generally that’s where you train. So when an OP talks about comparing a 400m swim workout who’s I think an adult onset swimmer, you can’t then compare something 10x more and wonder why the pace is off. Maybe the 1:10 Kona swim was 3 years ago, and so it’s like, go look at the splits in the set and that’s going to tell you what is happening.
Not natural swimmer = will have a harder time holding pace generally in the back end of long endurance swims because fatigue will have a much bigger degradation on an athlete in that scenario generally then a more experienced swimmer. And an wetsuit may even have a bigger issue if we are talking a full suit that potentially affects rotation etc. , especially in 1+ hour swims, etc. So this idea that your automatically faster in a wetsuit for every single person and even more for meh swimmers isn’t really all that true because there are so many different variables that affect that. Of course your going to generally be faster in a wetsuit vs non-wetsuit in a ow, but when talking about comparing it to actual pool v ow “paces”. It’s so inexact because of so many factors, it’s generally just not worth the worry. It’s why I said, the more experienced the swimmer they are, they don’t care what their actual “split” was, they care more where they were in the swim within the race and the gaps from there. If you have a very specific venue that you know the same course, year after year, of course you want to compare splits. But if your just talking reviewing over a ow time split, many times there are too many factors that will affect that “pace”. That to then worry about is going to almost be more negative than a positive.
ISo there’s plenty of pretty easy solutions to the OP imo. Again give us the splits every 500yd or whatever and it’ll be clear what happened. And you take what is happening in actual real sets, and then re-organize the workouts to improve your stroke under fatigue.
in most training principles, I think it just makes it more complicated when you add in “n=1” to somehow try and come away with some gotcha moments.
- yes I am not trying to do that I am just trying to understand what in their case and in other cases who are exceptional OW swimmers, what makes them swim above their pool capabilities. I was just giving a good example I am aware of. And so then to what we talk about later and we can both agree - a single 400 is not going to make much of a difference over a 4km swim
when an OP talks about comparing a 400m swim workout who’s I think an adult onset swimmer, you can’t then compare something 10x more and wonder why the pace is off. Maybe the 1:10 Kona swim was 3 years ago, and so it’s like, go look at the splits in the set and that’s going to tell you what is happening.
-agree. and op is not going to know all that detail shit
this idea that your automatically faster in a wetsuit for every single person and even more for meh swimmers isn’t really all that true
- sure we have all these exceptions, wind chop current etc but a wetsuit is going to make it a lot easier to just hang onto your stroke. a poor fitting or leaky boat wetsuit is a different story… this is really a side bar that is not a main point of interest here. some will bring up sighting as well
But if your just talking reviewing over a ow time split, many times there are too many factors that will affect that “pace”. That to then worry about is going to almost be more negative than a positive.
-absolutely. pace in OW really means shit as even two days in a row there is too much variation. you cant get through the water fast enough to measure exact similarities. pace in the pool is what is relevant to measure day to day then when extrapoloated out over longer distances in the pool you are going to see what your pace should be. thorpe used to do a 3km time trial every month just to measure aerobic work. its the 30 - 50 minutes swimming where its mostly all aerobic and you can feel what the aerobic improvements are (sure some anareobic contributions but by any large aerobic)
So I think the overall issue in this case is that where he currently *thinks his goal pace wise, likely isn’t where he actually is. Using that type of 400 workout as the barameter of the pace to then compare that to an straight 4k swim, makes very little sense. Now he’s added contexual clues of his swim background, his top swim speed in Kona, etc. And the thing with the wetsuit, if it’s a full wetsuit, it also has the potential to cause you even more fatigue which then only potentially degrades the stroke even more. So just wearing the wetsuit is a fallacy to think your just going to jump into an ows and “swim your pace” (which again it’s why I think worrying about “pace” is sorta stupid fools errand), even less so if your likely pace is incorrectly defined as “goal pace”.
It’s why I don’t even have to look at the splits and know he probaly went ~20s difference in pace from the start of that swim to the finish if he can hold 1:4x pace in the pool and his avg was 1:56. Now of course we are then talking about GPS accuracy of the pace, and of course that’s has it’s own issues.
Essential the background the OP provided would be imo not the data I’d use to figure out why you are or aren’t slower in ow. What’s your pace on 3 x 1k or whatever, that’s a much more realistic to what you will have to hold during your race.
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