Possible to improve 30min distance w/only 30min sessions?

Do you want to get faster by a 2 min or 8 min time span? Give us an idea .

Guys, in my opinion, serious improvement is swimming a mile in less than 18min - I consider that's impossible to achieve by swimming only 30min a day. Of course it's possible to improve technique and to swim it in relatively easy manner in 23 or even 22 min. For amateur it's not a bad result. To go down beyond that time IMO most likely you will need to swim harder and to spend more time in the water. Maybe before writing a training plan a good idea would be to ask Paul 1953 what time you expect to achieve? No, serious improvement is Paul making progress from his 30:00 minutes base time for his mile. Serious improvement is him improving his times and ability. I'm curious to see what he can accomplish with just 30 min a day. His "before" is 30 minutes, let's see how much he can drop. He should feel good about what ever he does. Applying some random external standard like doing a 1650 in 18 minutes or 1760 in ??:?? leads to comparing and despairing, which might cause him to give up and the point is for him to train as much and as hard and as smart as he can and enjoy swimming. He didn't tell us much of his story so we are giving suggestions with only some of the facts. Let's see how he does

...My times have always been around 30 minutes, give or take.... Take it! U can use one of the most important training protocol now under scientific research. Use your HR (Heart Rate) to fix ur training in this way: 1) Have a right medical check with a doctor specialist in sports and fix ur HR Max. Please don't use the "basic" law (220-age) because that is good just to talk about the "middle" in a population, not for you 2) Use a right cardio during ur swim (the best underwater is the "t-31" by Polar) 3) Swim at ur max HR but, important, if your doctor give u the HR max after a laboratory test (not in a pool) remember to decrease this "max" by 8-1o beats because in a pool ur max is not the same outwater. 4) and now, have this training: 4minutes at 90% of HR max, 3minutes at 60%. This for 3 times (if u can, or until ur exaustathion). Do that after 10minutes of warm-up and, let me know ciao

Depends a lot on your technique. If it can use a lot of major improvements then probably you can. If not, I would suspect it will be tough to make major improvements.

Guys, in my opinion, serious improvement is swimming a mile in less than 18min You come up with a program that could get a typical geezer to do a mile in 18 minutes? Please let me know. Thanks. For the original pooster? I would consider alternating three workouts. 1) Push as ahrd as you can for 30 minutes. 2) Short warmup. do a 400 fast, take a couple relaxed laps, do another 400 fast, (maybe a 3rd one?) short wind down. 3) Short warmup. 100 yard sprints (or maybe 3 lengths, which might be 110, if I understand your pool diminsions correctly) with short rests, until you have maybe 4 minutes left, then a wind down. Of course you time would get a whole loty better if you did longer workouts for a month or two. Then 30 minutes a day would slow the inevitable decline.

Don't think so. You may achieve some improvements by swimming exercises - that will improve your technique and times but not your performance and endurance. Common sets for swimmers who swim 1.5K are: 3-5x1500 - 60% MHR 15x100 - threshold swimming 10sec rest between 100s or 8-10x200 - same pattern. All these example sets definitely take more than 30min. Professional stayers usually swim >70 miles a week. Of course you still may swim a mile each training aerobically without taking care about times - that's very useful for your heart. :)

Hi, I went all out on Friday, and still fell just short of a mile :-( My question: Is it unrealistic to expect to improve my time without spending more time in the water? NO it IS possible, you can improve your mile time by just training 30 minutes a day, but it is more probable and possible when you train further, faster, better, and more often. Training 5 or 6 times a week is better than 3 or 4 Training 45 - 60 minutes per practice is better than 30. The quickest way for you to get faster is to improve your technique. If you are making any technique errors and if you improve them, your improvement will be proportional to the corrections you made. Because your mile takes you around 30 minutes, there has to be some low hanging technique improvement fruit for you to pick. Also since your pool is short (56 ft) I believe you can make your biggest fastest improvements by improving your turns, push offs, and streamlines. Concentrate on turning faster, pushing off harder, streamlining skinnier and gliding further and faster than you ever have before. Technique: Swim long and smooth, do a 2 beat kick, breathe every 2 or 3, Pacing: A mile is pretty long and it's wise to swim at a steady pace that you can sustain the whole way, this means you should go much easier at the beginning, work on even splitting and negative splitting What kind of suit are you wearing? There are many ways to improve. I wrote about them in SWIM FASTER FASTER Also consider the edvice I gave in Last 150 of my 500 falls off Scott put my advice into action and made dramatic improvements in his 500, the same concepts apply to the mile it's just a bit over 3 times further than a 500. What's your height and weight? If you're too heavy, become a slimmer swimmer. don't do the same work out each day hit different systems different days of the week Here's a sample week of practices: Mon warm up 8 minutes of easy 50's with 5 seconds rest (do awesome push offs) main set 4 x (swim strong and steady for 4:30, rest 30) cool down 100 easy on 2:00 Tue warm up 8 minutes of easy 50's with 5 seconds rest, awesome push offs main set 20 x 50 on 1:00 all fast best average cool down 100 easy on 2:00 Wed warm up 8 minutes of easy 50's with 5 seconds rest, awesome push offs main set 8 x (swim hard and steady for 2:00, rest 30 sec) cool down 100 easy on 2:00 Wed warm up 8 minutes of easy 50's with 5 seconds rest, awesome push offs main set 8 x (swim hard and steady for 2:00, rest 30 sec) cool down 100 easy on 2:00 Thu warm up 8 minutes of easy 50's with 5 seconds rest, awesome push offs main set 4 x (swim 75% for 2:00, swim 80% for 2:00 rest 60 sec) cool down 100 easy on 2:00 Fri warm up 5:00 like 5 easy 50's on 1:00 main set MILE FAST for time (awesome turns, push offs & streamlines) 100 easy 2:00 Sat warm up 8:00 easy 50's with 10 sec rest after each main set 20 x 25 FAST on 1:00 100 easy on 2:00 Sun off Lastly if you consistently act like you're a man on a mission to dramatically improve his mile You will, with out a doubt, but it takes what it takes. Is training harder, smarter, further, faster, & more often, with more desire, focus and intensity a price you're willing to pay? Hope this helps let us know what you do and how you do. Good luck, ande

Hi Paul! My :2cents: ... I would say yes, it is possible to improve your time to under 30 minutes. The main idea is that 96 lengths of your short pool equals 96 times 1 one length at a time. Make each length exactly the same as all others, improve the efficiency and speed of each length, and your time will fall. How many strokes do you take per length? Be conscious of the number. Better distance per stoke usually means more efficient use of energy, so in general, to a rough first approximation, fewer strokes per length is better. What is your breathing pattern? How many breaths per length do you take? How many do you need to stay in equilibrium? Also work on the push, and try to improve your streamline off the wall. My numbers for a decidedly non-record-setting 21 minute 1650 in a 25 yard pool (after the first few hundred to settle in): 13 strokes per length with 7 breaths per length for the first 800, then 15 strokes per length, 8 breaths per length the rest of the way (I breathe once per cycle on the right). I've watched much better distance swimmers than myself; each has a highly stereotyped stroke & breathing pattern they follow on each length. Play with your numbers and your patterns to find what works best for you.

Guys, in my opinion, serious improvement is swimming a mile in less than 18min - I consider that's impossible to achieve by swimming only 30min a day. Of course it's possible to improve technique and to swim it in relatively easy manner in 23 or even 22 min. For amateur it's not a bad result. To go down beyond that time IMO most likely you will need to swim harder and to spend more time in the water. Maybe before writing a training plan a good idea would be to ask Paul 1953 what time you expect to achieve?

I really like Ande's and Lefty's suggestions. I would also add one more: Time everything you do. When you swim a continuous distance, get your 100-yard or 200-yard splits. Keep a log of your times. There are some fancy watches out there that do this automagically, but it's easy enough with a simple stop watch. I hit split whenever I start and stop a set. On long sets, I do an open turn every 200 yards so I can hit the split button. At the end of my workout, I hit save. When I look at my log, I can tell if I'm slowing down over the course of a long set. I can also see how I've improved. This information helps me set realistic goals.