My swim coach at varsity always said swim like a duck meaning the most importand stuff happens under the water.Your comment made me think of that.
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Thatâs admittedly closer to a âswimâ workout. But itâs not really the same as what the posters above were referring to about âno intervals.â
Your workout significantly differs in such:
- 1:30 ON but a whole ungodly 2:00 OFF (for swimmers!). The intervals being discused above are not your VO2max type ones, but meant for a more threshold pace, so youâd be 1:30 ON, 15 seconds OFF. Not 2:00.
- Youâd also have to do it for the whole workout. No 24 mins of continuous cycling.
- Most importantly, weâre talking doing this no bike interval of longer than 5 minutes for EVERY bike workout you do for the season. Every single one. Name any cyclist who has ever done this, intentionally never riding more than 5 minutes at time before taking a 15-20sec break, for hour(s), for every single workout for their entire season.
I used to do sets like 50x200 on the track. Works great. Still wouldnât skip my long run though.
I donât disagree with âbest practiceâ, but if itâs so good from a fitness standpoint for swimming, why donât we do 90 minute workouts in running and cycling, 2:00 on, 20 seconds off, the entire time?
You have to be specific WHY doing this is better. One sort-of-legit argument is that you can swim with better form with those short rests, but then it begs the question why donât you do that to improve run leg speed and form as well? If itâs better to train with better form in the water, thereâs no reason you wouldnât want to do that in the run (for EVERY run).
With 10-15sec rest between, thatâs a tough workout! And yeah, itâs not like youâre doing this sort of no-interval longer than 200 for every workout, the entire season. You probably didnât do that workout more than once per week on average, Iâd guess.
Ok. But thatâs not 24mins, itâs 3 x 24;30 so nearly 90 mins of the 2 hours.
Also there is another variant that is 40s on at 400W, 20s off for first rep, 30:30 then 20:40 for the 3rd rep.
Todayâs swim set was 100s. 1k of Warmup stuff, then MS was 100m TT max, then 5x100m in theory at that pace+8 (Iâm slowest in lane so for me it was +2 but holding feet) then all that repeated. About 20s rest between the 5xreps, but good rest prior to the 100m TTs.
Tongue half in cheek here, but if we couldnât just âbuy speedâ with fancy carbon shoes/bike bling, would we end up resorting to training smarter in those disciplines. Or perhaps someone needs to bring out a range of carbon goggles, swim paddles and a hydrodynamic pull buoy.
One final thought. Running and Cycling at least there is stuff to stop you going insane for the longer endurance sets. But swimming - you just have to change it up to stay sane as thereâs only so much of staring at a line on the bottom of the pool you can do without turning into Graeme ObreeâŚ
Iâve found quite a few mental focus tricks to keep things interesting, almost endless stuff to focus on with various technique/form things for meâŚ
Iâm still awaiting any real âphysiologically advantageousâ reason to explain why we donât do this for running/cycling if itâs really that good in swimming. The argument that âwell swimming you get better technique if you take small restsâ should theoretically equally apply in running and possibly even in cycling (less so as youâre locked in). But I donât know of any run-bike workout thatâs like 90 minutes of 2:00 on, 15 seconds off, repeat for 2 hrs. Or a run-bike plan where your entire season is ALL runs of <5 minutes in length punctuated by rest, every single one of them.
What if you flip that that thought around to âwhy donât we swim longer intervals/continuous swims like we do running and cycling?â My guess is that the shoulder joint is more susceptible to injury than ankle/knee/hip and so training is shorter in swimming. These are three different sports with different physical demands and should be trained for and treated differently.
Come on, we know that tons of triathletes, even at pro level do this ALL the time, meaning long, steady swims, and they are FINE. Yeah, they do intervals too. And theyâre not all getting injured.
I think a great understated reason is just simply logistics, especially with squads/masters. A 5sec/100 difference is fine in a 100 and a 200, but in a 500+, youâre running into athletes getting lapped. Make it 5+sec, and youâre lucky youâre not getting lapped in a 500. You also donât even need to get âlappedâ - if you finish a 500 with a 60 second lag to the leader (who is waiting for you at the wall, yes they started 15 sec ahead of you due to the 3 other people in your lane too who left every 5sec and you were last) might soon have zero rest between intervals and the lane timing will be totally screwed.
Itâs also a lot easier to time yourself for steady swimming with the clock when you can stop to get your clock time every 100 or 200. Sure, Garmins will show your pace if youâre doing like 3000 straight, but ârealâ pure swimmers like using the pace clock instead of their Garmin so itâs much more practical to stay âon-paceâ with shorter sets. Plus the whole counting lengths issue with no watch doing it for you - I donât want to do mental math just to figure out if Iâm at 800 or 850 yds because I lost count and now have to go off my estimated clock pace that moment. Much easier to count lengths/distance at 100-200, vs 2000.
Importantly, when these interval-loving triathletes go train in open water, theyâre not all rushing to do open water set intervals. Sure, the logistics of laps in open water swimming is questionable, but logically - if itâs physiologically better to do âshort setsâ than one long set, why arenât triathletes at least making more than nominal attempts to do OWS intervals? As far as I know, itâs almost never mentioned as a major feature of OWS. Yes, I know you can argue itâs not âthe focusâ for OWS, but if itâs that important or that physiologically better to swim intervals only, youâd think at least a few people would be setting up their OWS to have interval-focus, between buoys etc.
Has anyone ever recommended training OWS with 1:20-3:00 minutes on, 15 seconds off, the ENTIRE WAY for 1+hrs, as you would in the pool? If such intervals are actually physiologically superior than the steady swim for swim training, there would have to be a compelling reason NOT to do it in OWS training.
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Again, that is 100% what we do in OW squad. Use the boats in the harbour as change points. Some sets will be longer and steadier, some will be changes of pace every 100m or so between easy, steady and max. Some weeks, itâs simple race sim swim of the half IM course (and more laps if IM training). Others, all
What Iâm sensing is that whilst not 100% what you are alluding to, then at least some coaches are doing variants of that.
One of the personal failings in my swimming is the focus after 10mins in OW. I drift into a âooh this is nice, look at the little fishes, hmm, nice soothing swellâ - I am way better in the pool with the reset every 20 odd seconds to keep the effort up and stick with the feet.
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Youâre right, thatâs probably not what Iâm alluding to.
Intervals per se are totally logical, sane, normal. ALL endurance sports utilize them.
What isnât typical is how in swimming you can do ALL intervals, ALL the time, for ALL your swims, and saying itâs simply a better way to train, period for swimming. Yet for some reason, all other endurance sports just donât do this, ever. They do intervals, but nobody in running and cycling is doing ALL intervals, ALL the time.
Iâm still awaiting a real justification for why this situation is the case. As stated, I do believe that if itâs true (I actually think it is) that thereâs physiological benefit in changing a 3000 swim straight to all 200s with 15sec rest, why donât we do the same with hourlong runs or bikes, with similar long-tempo intensity intervals with 15sec/rest, and do the same for ALL the workouts as youâd do in swimming.
Thatâs still a pretty different looking workout than the ones youâre probably doing in your OW squad intervals - Iâll bet those intervals have more than 15sec rest and are long enough to be more like a running or cycling 4â on 2â off or 8â on 3-5-â off VO2 or threshold set. Iâd be surprised if you were doing like you would the pool of an hour of broken 1:30-3:00 on/15sec off, the entire time, as described as how coaches would prefer their swimmers to do over 3000 straight.
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Ok. So I guess through winter when OW is hard, then the longest I/we do would be 800s - monthly and perhaps a single 1500m TT. Typically 400s and 600s would be the ânormâ on a given week. In summer, then we keep the pool twice a week but put a couple of OW in. And regularly that will include 20m continuous swims, certainly monthly Iâd be doing 2k continuous swims.
But that then comes back to the practicalites for many people to be able to swim steady state 1500s in a pool for the reasons covered above - avoiding lane overtaking, boredom, lap counting, which arenât issues for cycling or running. I think if we were restricted to velodrome and track then weâd probably train more like we do in the pool.
Good discussion.
Iâd be fine if it were justn a logistics issue. But even you have seen how so many coaches even here swear that itâs a better training stimulus to break up those long swims into small repeats.
If there is a real physiologic advantage we should be doing this in run and bike. But we donât which makes me wonder which side is more right about the physiologic benefit outside of just pool timing logistics.
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Hmm, although we are only doing the swim for 1 hour (ish). The bike is 5 or more for most and the run 3 or more. Noting the relative lack of muscle crossover between swim to the others, but crossover for the others then potentially that comes into it.
Or maybe youâve hit on something. (up to here serious, pink afterâŚ) Potentially you could spend the next few years running some controlled experiments with a group of athletes to see if you have hit on something, or the other way is of course just to call it TrainMAX Pro+, create a youtube channel, pay 50 blonde tanned influencers to say that they bought your programme and it changed their life and youâre made.
While true the swim coaches here often coach pure swimmers too who race only a few minutes long so the duration of the shorter IM swim doesnât seem to be important for such interval based training.
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Iâm of the opinion that weâve been oversold the physiologic benefits of short swim intervals (I do think they have a place and are a good thing but Iâm not throwing the long sets out either) when the real reason is sheer lane logistics but Im not knowledgeable about these intricacies and thus am awaiting any real answers from coaches or experienced swimmers that arenât intrinsically logically inconsistent.
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Yeah, I think did it leaving on 1min. 45-48s per 200m. Slightly over 6min/mile pace. Iâd only do one workout like that a week, but it would always be a broken 10k, like 25x400, or 10x1k but sometimes a big Monaghetti run.
I asked the same question of why we train the way we do in the pool vs bike and run, and the coach I asked had a brilliant answer⌠I just canât remember what it was. Iâve watch a couple of ultra swimmers at my pool do 90min+ non-stop swims, so there is that.
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I agree but this avoids answering my question-why are arm recoveries so different in pools to open water, and in open water if we should be concentrating on a straight arm/windmill type approach is this something that we should also be replicating in training?
Why swim in the pool a nice pretty high elbow led recovery with a glide, only to the race and throw it all out throwing your arms over focusing on turnover? Train like u race?
Exactly!! Itâs like swimming is just steadfast stuck in doing things the way they have always been done just âbecauseâ.
From a physiological viewpoint it makes little sense to me that there are so many rest intervals in swim training. Heck I donât think my squad has anything longer than 200m without a rest interval, why??
Why not at least go into float recovery laps before hitting the next interval like you do running?? This would again simulate surges in racing etc
Some people do that type of training. Few laps steady, one lap hard, steady then easy then start again. Recover from surge while still swimming steady. I think most swimmers will just have a style mostly the same in pool or open water. A straight arm person doesnât go ian thorpe when they get in a pool.
Swim training is very simple but very complex