A good swim time is one that wins your age group. It’s informative and fun to see what really good 20 and 30 year olds can do but when I hit my sixties the only thing I really care about are the guys my age. I just checked out the masters records for 65-69 year olds 1 mile cable swim, 22:53. I still have some headroom on improvement!
And then for a comparison, the 5k USATF record for M65-69 is 17:31. (Geez that’ crazy fast!)
https://www.usatf.org/…=65-69&sport=LDR
Anyone want to say if a 22:53 is closer to a 20min 5k or a 17:31 5k?
Actually, very few people swim that “1-mile cable swim” and that record is not really appropriate for comparison to the USATF 5000 m record. We really need to compare WRs in the pool and on the track. The FINA WR for the 65-69 AG for 1500 scm is 18:54 (1:15.6/100 scm or about 1:08/100 yd), which is about 34% slower than the WR for 1500 scm of 14:08. The WR for the 65-69 for 5000 m is 16:39 (5:21.6/mi), which is about 32% slower than the WR of 12:37.