Tell me what swimming to do!

Triathlon Forum
1

Merry Christmas - or if that’s not your bag - general non-denominational winter greetings and warm wishes for happiness and prosperity, everyone!

I’m getting really lazy in the pool and need some structure. I’m racing my 3rd Ironman next year and would like to see how close I can get to the magic 10, and swimming is an area for improvement. I mucked about with the Swim Smooth DVD programme a year or so ago over the winter and found myself pissing about doing too many drills and not enough swimming. I am convinced I need to do more actual swimming.

Can folks recommend what some basic sessions should look like? Here are my capabilities (or lack thereof) and constraints -

30-40mins available in the water, 3x a week. Not great, but it’s the most I can get.
No freestyle as a kid, learned from scratch age 33.
Swam 1h 10m last Ironman, in a wetsuit.
400m around 7:00, best 100m 1:35. I can hang on to 1:45/100m at a push. If I do much more than 4-5 intervals I start needing big rests to catch my breath.
Yes, I am much, much faster OW in a wetsuit than I am in the pool. I can’t flip turn for shit (working on that) and take really slow open turns, and also tend to be faster with a pull buoy. Certainly it seems a lot easier.
Contrary to the above, I can actually kick when I have to. If I kick hard I can make a 25m length in around 30s, but won’t be able to breathe for about a day.
25m pool.
My stroke feels strong for the first couple lengths but then my feel for the stroke disappears in a breathless cloud of lactic acid. God knows how I ever swim 3.8k (but I have done, twice).

Based on that last bit, I think I really need to work on my specific swim fitness. I have decent general aerobic fitness, around 37 min for 10k run.

Additional info - I have just bought a Garmin Swim watch to help me count lengths, time intervals, assess my crapness etc. I have stretch cords in my garage at home and can probably blag the odd quarter of an hour here or there.

So, how should I fill my 30-40 mins?

Appreciate any pointers, I realize I’m not paying anybody here to coach me and am asking for favours. I’m unlikely to afford any coaching in the near future (two kids in nursery) but am trying to figure out a way to join a weekly masters swim.

Thanks all,
Rich.

2

I will take a swing.

As you probably know 3 or 4 30-40 minute sessions is not nearly enough time to achieve your max potential. But, we all work with what we got…

If you boogie you can get in 2000 yards per session. But, that will require you to swim straight through the entire workout. I love fartlek swims. Swim straight through the entire time, alternating between fast intervals, and active rest intervals…

If I had only 35 minutes to swim, and was concerned about my endurance and fitness I would do the following.

Warm up with an easy 500… Then straight into a fast 250, followed by a slow 500, fast 250, slow 500, slow 250… Shower up, and get back to work.

Take the slow ones as slow as you need to, but work on body position and form. Feel free to use any tools and toys that let you get in the yardage.

3

20x100 with 20secs rest, descend 1-5.

go.

4

20x100 with 20secs rest, descend 1-5.

go.

+1, you can also progress this as you build fitness to the same workout with evens fast, odds steady, or 20 x 100 at HIM pace on :20

imho if you are a 1:10 IM swimmer than building fitness is going to get you way farther than doing endless drills to improve your technique.

5

I should be more helpful. Lets do a program for 3x per week (assume M, W, F)

Monday:
20x100 @:20s rest - descend 1-5

Wednesday
4x(5x100) @ 20 s rest descend 1-5 (1st set swim, 2nd set pull, 3rd set swim, 4th pull)

Friday
5x(4x100) @ 20s rest - build each 100 (swim, pull, swim, pull, swim)

You’re welcome.

6

A different thought here…if you can ever find time for a lake/ocean swim and work your sighting that can be massive. Drafting as well, but sounds like you can do that fairly well now. Like you I’m faster in OW than a pool and that is a Speedo to Speedo comparison. My turns are marginal after 200 yards so whatever little advantage I get from that is more than offset by the benefits of drafting and then some. I can hang in a pack in OW with swimmers that destroy me in a short course pool routinely. So, in short do all you can do to swim the prescribed amount on race day and not MORE;)

7

I always forget that some of you guys live in places which have lakes and oceans full of liquid water, all year long. I noticed on the drive to work yesterday that one of the small bays was freezing over.

8

I always forget that some of you guys live in places which have lakes and oceans full of liquid water, all year long. I noticed on the drive to work yesterday that one of the small bays was freezing over.

What does this mean? Freezing water? :wink:

9

I should be more helpful. Lets do a program for 3x per week (assume M, W, F)

Monday:
20x100 @:20s rest - descend 1-5

Wednesday
4x(5x100) @ 20 s rest descend 1-5 (1st set swim, 2nd set pull, 3rd set swim, 4th pull)

Friday
5x(4x100) @ 20s rest - build each 100 (swim, pull, swim, pull, swim)

You’re welcome.

Sorry - I just know that this is an idiotic question, but does “descend” mean get faster or slower? It sounds like it means getting faster (i.e. descending the time of the interval), but then again, it also sounds like the opposite of “build” , which must mean get faster.

10

Open water swimming in Canada…

https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8375/8589319511_8ed5d9eb61_z.jpg

11

I should be more helpful. Lets do a program for 3x per week (assume M, W, F)

Monday:
20x100 @:20s rest - descend 1-5

Wednesday
4x(5x100) @ 20 s rest descend 1-5 (1st set swim, 2nd set pull, 3rd set swim, 4th pull)

Friday
5x(4x100) @ 20s rest - build each 100 (swim, pull, swim, pull, swim)

You’re welcome.

Sorry - I just know that this is an idiotic question, but does “descend” mean get faster or slower? It sounds like it means getting faster (i.e. descending the time of the interval), but then again, it also sounds like the opposite of “build” , which must mean get faster.

Build is within the same effort so here the 100. Descend is each interval (100 here) time will get faster.

12

I should be more helpful. Lets do a program for 3x per week (assume M, W, F)

Monday:
20x100 @:20s rest - descend 1-5

Wednesday
4x(5x100) @ 20 s rest descend 1-5 (1st set swim, 2nd set pull, 3rd set swim, 4th pull)

Friday
5x(4x100) @ 20s rest - build each 100 (swim, pull, swim, pull, swim)

You’re welcome.

wow.

13

I have not seen snow since I left the midwest…almost 30 years ago. Here’s to 30 more snow free years!!
Open water swimming in Canada…

https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8375/8589319511_8ed5d9eb61_z.jpg

14

I should be more helpful. Lets do a program for 3x per week (assume M, W, F)

Monday:
20x100 @:20s rest - descend 1-5

Wednesday
4x(5x100) @ 20 s rest descend 1-5 (1st set swim, 2nd set pull, 3rd set swim, 4th pull)

Friday
5x(4x100) @ 20s rest - build each 100 (swim, pull, swim, pull, swim)

You’re welcome.

Sorry - I just know that this is an idiotic question, but does “descend” mean get faster or slower? It sounds like it means getting faster (i.e. descending the time of the interval), but then again, it also sounds like the opposite of “build” , which must mean get faster.

if you descend 1-5, you might do something like 1:40, 1:38, 1:36, 1:34, 1:32 for each block of 5, and you are going at a steady pace for each 100

build means that each length within each 100 gets progressively faster. eg. 25, 24, 23, 22 seconds for a 1:34 total time. (don’t stop to time it, it really goes on feel).

15

I should be more helpful. Lets do a program for 3x per week (assume M, W, F)

Monday:
20x100 @:20s rest - descend 1-5

Wednesday
4x(5x100) @ 20 s rest descend 1-5 (1st set swim, 2nd set pull, 3rd set swim, 4th pull)

Friday
5x(4x100) @ 20s rest - build each 100 (swim, pull, swim, pull, swim)

You’re welcome.

wow.

I know, I’m getting soft in my old age…20 seconds rest…

16

Even during race season Lake Ontario doesn’t get much warmer that that! LOL I think the Toronto Triathlon Festival we had 14C (57F) water in Mid July. It was such a treat to have numb hands and feet coming into T1.

17

I always forget that some of you guys live in places which have lakes and oceans full of liquid water, all year long. I noticed on the drive to work yesterday that one of the small bays was freezing over.

We are the opposite. Here, we call them rivers, and if they actually have water in them we call it a flood.

John

18

Awesomeness everybody, thanks for the input. Jason, that looks like hell, which is probably just what I need. So assuming I’m able to repeat at 1:45/100m with 20s rest that is 2:05 per interval, so just a bit over 40 mins for the Monday workout. I’m going to give that a bash next time I’m in the pool and record it on my new shiny Garmin swim doodah, see how far I get…

I’m in Yorkshire, UK so not much chance of OW swimming for another 5 months!

Thanks again,
Richard.

19

Seconding Jason here-20x100 is the best “bang for your buck” set. It’s a good go-to for squeezing a lot of quality into a short period of time.

My favorite variations:

the normal 20x100 best effort w/:20 rest

2x(10x100) Descend each set on a set interval (eg 1:30, so you’re not getting a set amount of rest)

5x100 on interval, 10x100 flat out on 2:00 (build some speed and let the lactic build up!!), 5x100 on interval again (try to make it the same interval but that may be unrealistic depending on how hard you sprinted the 10x100

Another favorite set that totals 2000yds (which will be a good amount for 30-40 mins) is:
5x(100 tempo, 4x75 on interval)
The interval should give you 5-10’ of rest. I do them on 1:05ish.
If you want, you can do rds 1,3,5 as swim and 2,4 as pull and pull/paddles respectively.

Yet another favorite set would be
5x400 on interval giving 20-30’ rest. 1,3,5 are swim, 2,4 are swim w/paddles (not pull-you can still kick-this allows non-lifetime swimmers to build strength with paddles w/o as much injury)

One thing that our coach does if we have limited time and he wants lots of yards is to put the fins on. So we could do 3x800 fins alt kick/swim by 200 and get a good set in (although typically that would be a precursor to something like 4x400 FRIM and not a workout unto itself).

Good luck!

20

you’re welcome

initially, it very well might be hell, but it will get easier over time to complete. if you only have time to do 18 or so, that’s fine. nothing magic about it.

When I get in for my lunchtime swim (about 40 minutes) I often do something at a similar effort level. I’m focused on pool events 400m and under, so I’ll also throw in kick and stroke work, but given your time limitations, better IMO to keep it extremely focused on freestyle (pull especially).

if you must do drills, do them on the easiest repeats. (e.g. #1, 6, 11, and 16 of a descend 1-5 set, or the first length of a build set).