17th Sept 2013
Swimming for me and no doubt many others is the most frustrating aspect to triathlon. Unlike running and cycling where more training usually equates to improved times, swimming just dosent work like that.
I have looked at swimming in some detail, I went to the London Olympics and watched the world's best swimmers, I watched closely their technique and marvelled at their effortless speed through the water.
I have devised numerous swim plans to improve times over the years but I always seem to plateau. I have tried swimming longer distance, mixing strokes, working on technique, swim speed and so on. I think I have finally found a formula to improve my swimming and hopefully move up to the faster swim waves in next years triathlons.
As a rule of thumb I try and swim 3 times a week for about 40 minutes to an hour. I used to swim one long swim at a comfortable pace and then medioum swim sets of 200 metres or so on the other 2 sessions.
MY TIMES WERE HARDLY IMPROVING I HAD TO CHANGE SOMETHING SO THIS IS WHAT I DID.:
Swimming is about feeling the water and creating good memory so when you swim that one beautiful length and you feel like a dolphin you have a desire to reproduce it again and again. This might sound a bit weird, but for me, if I am labouring and fighting through the water and having an off day then I stop right there. Take a few minutes, take stock and maybe do a couple of lenghts on technique.
So for Quarter 1 of my training plan, I have devised a simple swim plan: Basically, I swim 3 times a week. Session one is a 350 metre warm up where I include some drills, such as catch up, fist drills, finger tip drills etc. My main set is 8x100 at 80% effort with 30 sec rest intervals and then a 350 m warm down (include some back stroke)
For session 2 and 3 its the same warm up and warm down but for session 2 its 16 x50metres at 85% efffort with 40 sec rest and session 32 x25metres at 90% effort with 45 sec rest. So that's 3 swims a week of 1500 metres for each session. Not a lot of swimming but as the year progresses I will increase the yardage. My main goal for Q1 and Q2 is to get my body and mind encoded into the memory of swimming fast...You might look at this and think where is the endurance swimming? Well you may well be proved right, only time will tell. The plan is to set a time trial every 4 weeks of 400 metres initially and plot progress. Will let you know how it goes. My last TT for 400 metres was 7.07. My target by end of Quarter 1 (Q1) is sub 7 minutes. Only a few weeks to go to end of September and end of Q1 so nearly there. End of Q2 (end of December this year) my target is sub 6.30!
One thing I also want to mention is technique..I do not swim bi laterlally. I prefer to swim to one side, I will do some bi lateral lengths in my warm up/down. The bottom line is I feel breathing to one side is where I feel comfortable. I am 6 ft 2" and have a fairly long stroke ( it could be better) but I generally take 18 to 19 strokes per 25 metres.
Thats about it for swimming, nearly 3 months into my training, swimming has been the most challenging in terms of improvements. Quarter 2 will be October, November and December, and I think this will really give me a barometer of where my training is heading.
.Next time I will talk about the running and cycling...and share how my training plan is really paying dividens so far!
David Ed Smith
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