I have difficulty tracking how many lengths I swim. I’m trying to build volume so I get in the pool for about 45 minutes - 1 hr (work constraints) and swim as much as possible. This is 2x to 3x a week. After about 10-12 lengths, I zone, my mind goes elsewhere and I have no idea how many I’ve done.Was that 10? 12? 20?
I’ve read different suggestions from alphabetting (touch 1 is A, touch 2 is B, etc.) to swim beads. Any different techniques you guys use? Ways to keep your mind engaged?
I’m a long time swimmer. What worked best for me was counting down by 25. So 20 lengths was 500 yards, and I’d just count down by 25. This worked really well. I’d sort of do the same thing in races, too. I tend to focus on the number where I’m at, and that can help the swimming go by faster.
As the second poster said, swimming organized sets is important too. When designing workouts, it can help to have some kind of pattern to your sets that makes them easier to remember where you are. There is an “art” to this that is well-known to swimmers, and can take novices a while to understand, since it is a lot more structured than workouts in the other sports.
I also got a Garmin Swim, and I actually like it a lot. It is definitely nice when I am doing longer pieces, like over 800 yards/meters at a time, when I just don’t feel like counting, or when I am focusing on things like “feel” and technique on a longer swim. I definitely have times when I am wrong about how far I have swum. The Garmin Swim is not perfect, but it is 99% accurate and not that expensive (around $150). Plus it uploads to Garmin Connect and other sites via ANT+ and that takes the work out of tracking my workouts. It doesn’t work open-water, but that’s ok by me.
If you aren’t swimming structured sets, just use time as your metric. Make sure you know roughly what your pace per 100 is, and work backwards from there to figure out you distance.
Btw, I don’t recommend that approach, and getting in the pool to just swim as many laps as possible is a dumb way to actually get faster.
When doing long sets I count by the 100yds. Breathe to the left on first 100yds and to the right on second 100yds then it’s always left on odd, right on even numbers. If I’m off it’s usually only by 50yds so I’ll just throw in an extra couple to make sure.
I use a clothes pin and the lane line plastic float things. Always do sets and after each set, I move the clothes pin up one plastic float. Easy way to keep track of how many have been completed.
I gave up on counting laps on my own, so I got the 910xt 2 yrs ago. Garmin swim also works. I just had a hard time counting after you get past 2k. Having the watch do the counting let’s you focus on each set
I spent $30 or so on a very basic lap counter. Wear it on your finger, hit the button with your thumb every time you touch the wall.
That’s sounds about right if I’m gonna spend money. I figure this is such a basic thing that I shouldn’t need to buy something! Brand or link? Looking at a few on swimoutlet.com.
When doing long sets I count by the 100yds. Breathe to the left on first 100yds and to the right on second 100yds then it’s always left on odd, right on even numbers. If I’m off it’s usually only by 50yds so I’ll just throw in an extra couple to make sure.
I count by 25’s or 50’s. Apparently I value 50m more than I value 1 lap as I find I often drop 1 lap, even in a set of 400, but rarely drop 50m.
I spent $30 or so on a very basic lap counter. Wear it on your finger, hit the button with your thumb every time you touch the wall.
That’s sounds about right if I’m gonna spend money. I figure this is such a basic thing that I shouldn’t need to buy something! Brand or link? Looking at a few on swimoutlet.com.
I find the mental math keeps me engaged, helps time go by… and is one of the things that makes a “swimmer” a swimmer. I only swam competitively for 3 years in HS, but feel like I still absorbed that culture fully… same with running XC, road racing and MTB racing.
I usually know someone is a triathlete or a “runner” when they either have a watch on their wrist or some sort of counting aide on the side of the pool.
I use a Garmin Swim because I like to gather the data. However, I don’t check my watch during an interval to see how much I’ve done…
I usually have a workout in mind before I get to the pool and I never just show up and swim whatever. I always have a plan on what I’m gonna do for a Warmup, Main 1, Main 2, Cool Down.
My intervals are short max 200yd but lately I’ve done 300s while training for IM. I play with send off / rest time in between if I want to make it more challenging.
I count 100s… for some reason it’s easier for me. I swim 4 laps = 100, done and on to the next… pretty easy.
I use the pace clock at the pool because it’s huge and I can even take a peak while swimming but if I go to the gym I’ll use my Garmin Swim - it has this very nice feature called Rest Timer - every time you hit the interval stop button it takes you to a page that shows the time since you started the last interval and the time since you stopped. You don’t have to do any math to figure out your next send off time - not that it would be hard anyway.
Using a watch is not a “triathlete thing”. It allows me to always know for every workout what my paces are, track things such as stroke rate… weekly volume etc. I know exactly what I’m capable of swimming in a race without killing myself or going too slow and I usually come very close to that.
There’s simply no need for a gadget for this, just use the pace clock and do sets.
I realize the pace clock isn’t intuitive for non-swimmers so here’s how you use it:
Let’s say your average 50yd pace is :40 secondsIf you’re using an analog clock you start on “the top” or the 0.
Each 50 will be in (roughly) :40 second increments, so doing a 100 = coming in on the 20, doing a 200 = coming in on the 40, and so on.
Counting a longer swim like a 500 is easily done by breaking it into chunks - 150/100/150/100 (or whatever) and this could be part of your focus (smooth on the 150s, hard on the 100s). And even then you don’t lose count because you started on the top and you’re holding :40s so you come in around the 40. Come in at 0 and you missed a 50, come in at 20 and you went too far. Of course you can start on the 5, or 10, or 30 (“the bottom”) but the basic math is the same.
The benefit is you can tell if you’re falling off pace (I did a 200 and came in on the :48) but it’s also the basis for doing sets (5x200 @3:00 should give me :20 sec rest on each), and gauging improvement (I used to hold 4:00s for 300s @5min, now I hold 3:45s. Maybe next time I do them on 4:30?)
And doing sets make it easy to know how far you’ve swum (I did a 400 warm up, 10x50 @1:00, 4x400@ 5:00, and 250 warm down. I did 2,500)
