My big question is...how often should I swim/train to achieve my swim goals?
I never know if swimming 5 days a week vs swimming 7 days is better because some days your body is just tired and you end up having not-as-good-workout. Does that make the workout productive or is rest better?
I was swimming everyday for 3 months straight practically, working myself really hard, doing twice a week weights, and then I hurt my shoulder for the 1st time in my life! I swam competitively in high school and never had an injury. It made me feel old.
However, I still want to work hard and achieve my goals but I just don't know if swimming everyday is the answer. I understand that it also depends WHAT I swim daily and how intense I work as well...but I just do whatever workout the masters coach gives us that day. So it varies.
I feel like I'm training without any idea of how to get to where I want.
I have a very ambitious goal...but fortunately I told myself I'd just like to achieve this some time in my life..whether it's in two years or 20 years....but I would like to drop 5 seconds in my 100 freestyle. Someday. Yes, it's obviously incredibly difficult to drop that much time in a sprint event but I want to! The question is...how to get there? Is swimming everyday the key? Or maybe it has nothing to do with number of times I work out but more about what I'm actually doing at the practice. But what should I be doing? Of course technique is important.
I'd just like to hear some suggestions. I feel like I'm swimming in the dark!
Thanks!
-Helen
Don't do a set like 10 x 1:30 very often. It won't help your 100 free much and isn't a good indicator set.
I agree. Your ability to hold 1:25s on 10x100 on 1:30 really gives me no idea how fast you can go on a maximum effort 100. Now, something like 5x100 on 8:00 as fast as possible tells me a lot more. If your goal is 1:04, but you can't go faster than 1:10 on these then it tells me you've still got some work to do to achieve your goal.
Of course when you are swimming with a team you can't always do exactly what you want to do, but most coaches are open to individuals or lanes altering things as long as you aren't messing up those who are doing the workout as written. Just look at Ande's blog. He's pretty much the master of tweaking workouts to fit his goals.
Don't do a set like 10 x 1:30 very often. It won't help your 100 free much and isn't a good indicator set.
I agree. Your ability to hold 1:25s on 10x100 on 1:30 really gives me no idea how fast you can go on a maximum effort 100. Now, something like 5x100 on 8:00 as fast as possible tells me a lot more. If your goal is 1:04, but you can't go faster than 1:10 on these then it tells me you've still got some work to do to achieve your goal.
Of course when you are swimming with a team you can't always do exactly what you want to do, but most coaches are open to individuals or lanes altering things as long as you aren't messing up those who are doing the workout as written. Just look at Ande's blog. He's pretty much the master of tweaking workouts to fit his goals.
