I just read the guy swam 70,000 meters the week he competed in Athens. That is 43.4 miles. Seventeen races. I just read an editorial (quite a good one) in an old Sports Illustrated that discussed Phelps.
I got to wondering- What could a guy like this do the Kona swim in? Any guesses? I mean, could he go 45:00?
45:00? Man, I would think so … I loved the commercial aired prior to the Olympics of him swim across the ocean to Ellis Island and Statue of Liberty, then turning around and going back.
43 miles in 1 week? Well, that is just under my current weekly run mileage 
Holy Smokes …
Thorpe would go 45 but Grant Hackett would go 44!
thats right. 45 min. doing the butterfly…
Funny you mention that.
When I was at Doug Stern’s Triathlon Training camp in Curacao, Netherlands Antilles, Olympic Gold Medalist Sheila Taormina was one of our coaches.
We were doing a rather demanding two mile open water water swim, point to point, in the Caribbean at the end of the week, and most of us were in a bit of a lather about getting through it. To me, this was Navy SEAL stuff. I mean, we were out in the middle of the deep water where the men in gray suits swim.
Sheila did the two mile open water swim entirely *butterfly. *When she finished she turned around and swam back freestyle.
I don’t know if he’s swum many open water races previously but there’s a big difference between pool swimming and open water swimming. Particularly if the chop gets up it can quickly wreck silky smooth technique.
Having said that we had one of the best open water swimmers (from surf lifesaving) enter the team event over in IMWA (Busso) and swim (from memory) 44 mins which was close to 10 minutes quicker than the second best swim in the overall field. This was in 2005 when the conditions were, from all accounts, pretty miserable. As I said though, he was a surf lifesaver used to swimming in big seas. From memory too he wasn’t far off the world’s best pool swimmers in the 1500m. I don’t know what Phelps swims for 1500m but I’s be putting my money on Larsen Jensen (that’s your 1500m guy from memory) having a better Kona swim before Phelps.
like someone said…he’d go 45 doing fly…
I just read the guy swam 70,000 meters the week he competed in Athens. That is 43.4 miles. Seventeen races. I just read an editorial (quite a good one) in an old Sports Illustrated that discussed Phelps.
I got to wondering- What could a guy like this do the Kona swim in? Any guesses? I mean, could he go 45:00?
Wow, 43 miles and that is during a taper!!
Definatley a lot of miles…but the guy swims 66% faster than me!
So, let’s do the math…
Okay, that’s still a lot of miles!!! Continue.
;o)
Tom - If I remember correctly he came out of michigan’s swim program. One of the coaches i coached with was a UM grad. She said 100,000 or more weeks were not uncommon.
That being said I think he exits the water in a new course record about 5 min up on the field.
Actually, I think he came out of some place in Maryland, but is now at Michigan’s swim program (very good place to be) as he followed some coach.
He swims with his coach who is at Michigan. He came out of Maryland, but cannot compete in NCAA b/c he is a pro.
he’s a volunteer coach for UM. but swims with Club Wolverine… GO BLUE!
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In the middle of practice, he should be able to swim 2.4 miles in a pool in around 40 to 41 minutes. From there, it’s just a matter of figuring out how well he would swim open water. I don’t know any specifics about his training, but I would be surprised if he has not swum more then 140,000 yards in a week at least a few times in his life.
Silverman had 3 relays - each with a top swimmer. Phelps may be faster than all three or maybe slower - hard to say as I’ve seen more than a few great pool swimmers suck in open water (and I mean suck although thats mainly 55 degree no wetsuit ocean swims which adds the cold factor). I’d imagine a guy like Phelps would do well but it is a different beast. Unfortunately the 3 relay guys had tough conditions or they would have gone at least a couple minutes faster. Hawaii is sans-wetsuit. I’d guess 43-44 min in decent conditions.
Dave
In the middle of practice, he should be able to swim 2.4 miles in a pool in around 40 to 41 minutes. From there, it’s just a matter of figuring out how well he would swim open water. I don’t know any specifics about his training, but I would be surprised if he has not swum more then 140,000 yards in a week at least a few times in his life.
These guys have mamoth flip turns, are incredibly streamlined off the wall and come out 1/3 off the way down the pool. Wouldn’t he lose a little time with the underwater off the turns…making an open water time maybe more like 43 minutes.
Like one of the other posters mentioned-pool swimming is a lot different than open water. Some pool swimmers are not good open water swimmers and some open water swimmers are not good pool swimmers. There are other open water or distance swimmers out there that can smoke, just for one example-check out the new kid- Chip Peterson–he swims 10k in 1 hour, fifty minutes and 13 seconds (yes that is a swim time). http://tarheelblue.cstv.com/sports/c-swim/spec-rel/060606aaa.html
I’ve got to believe that Phelps can beat all three of those guys in a 2.4mi swim. They are 3 of the top open water guys in the US, but they all focus on 10K+. I think Phelps, Chip Peterson, and a couple others beat those three simply by picking it up with 500m to go.
I think John Kenny would kick his ass in an ironman swim.