I guess some background information may help you in answering my question. Hello, my name is Alex and I am quickly approaching my last year of high school swimming. Last high school season I finished my 200 yard free with my best time of 2:12.17 (not that stellar I know :cry: ) However I did end up getting second place overall. Now next high school season I'm ranked first in the 200 yard free, but there's always room for improvement. I would LOVE to get the school record (1:55.45) by may 2012 but that's pushing it I think. So how do you swim a 200 free?
Last 200 yard free I swam I got a time of 2:17.09 I tried breathing every 4 the whole race and it really tired me out.
I believe my next strategy is going to be
1st 25 - go 99% breathing every 4
75 - 500 pace breathing every 2
50 - going 100% breathing every 6
50 - anything I got left
There are different strategies for swimming this race in HS duel meets where you are competing for points, as opposed to a meet where you are competing for times and for qualifying.
In duel HS meets, I always tried to know who i was swimming against in the 200 and what else i would be swimming and expecting in the meet. The 200 was early in the meet event sequence, so strategy was important. Our coach tracked opponent times from other HS meets and in some cases we scouted the meets to get times. Knowing the opponents times indicated what you were up against. So for instance, if the opponent takes off like a bat, but has slower times than you, you know not to let the "hare" drag you out too fast -- knowing times, you can plan and know that you will catch them on the back end. Also, if you will be swimming the 500 about 20 - 30 min. later and maybe still a relay or two, all in about 1.5 hours, you might want to just swim the 200 to get your place/points and save it for your next races. In a duel meet 200 you can follow a strategy and even change the strategy according to conditions.
The startegy for swimming against time is to work out the splits you need as described previously and then work on technique and conditioning to be able to reach and hold them.
In HS swimming (in my experience) it was hard to be a distance swimmer and lower times a great deal during the meet season. Between practicing hard and 1 or 2 meets a week, plus all the other stuff going on, your body, which is still growing/developing, can't get enough rest to make the big adaptations that come from the training until you rest it. You can easily "plateau" and think you aren't improving, become discouraged, etc. If you've been training hard and eating right, times may drop substantially at the end of the season when the duel meets are over and you can taper, get rest, and let the adaptations resulting from training occur and pay-off. Adaptations from training occur when you rest after you train. No rest, no adaptation.
So as you swim your 200s this year focusing on the 1:55 goal, don't get discouraged if improvement doesn't seem contiuous or proportional to the work you are putting in, and you don't reach the goal before the end of the duel meets. At your age and current times, the taper can produce huge time drops in a 200, provided you've worked to improve your technique and worked hard in your training sets. Good luck and most importantly enjoy the journey.
There are different strategies for swimming this race in HS duel meets where you are competing for points, as opposed to a meet where you are competing for times and for qualifying.
In duel HS meets, I always tried to know who i was swimming against in the 200 and what else i would be swimming and expecting in the meet. The 200 was early in the meet event sequence, so strategy was important. Our coach tracked opponent times from other HS meets and in some cases we scouted the meets to get times. Knowing the opponents times indicated what you were up against. So for instance, if the opponent takes off like a bat, but has slower times than you, you know not to let the "hare" drag you out too fast -- knowing times, you can plan and know that you will catch them on the back end. Also, if you will be swimming the 500 about 20 - 30 min. later and maybe still a relay or two, all in about 1.5 hours, you might want to just swim the 200 to get your place/points and save it for your next races. In a duel meet 200 you can follow a strategy and even change the strategy according to conditions.
The startegy for swimming against time is to work out the splits you need as described previously and then work on technique and conditioning to be able to reach and hold them.
In HS swimming (in my experience) it was hard to be a distance swimmer and lower times a great deal during the meet season. Between practicing hard and 1 or 2 meets a week, plus all the other stuff going on, your body, which is still growing/developing, can't get enough rest to make the big adaptations that come from the training until you rest it. You can easily "plateau" and think you aren't improving, become discouraged, etc. If you've been training hard and eating right, times may drop substantially at the end of the season when the duel meets are over and you can taper, get rest, and let the adaptations resulting from training occur and pay-off. Adaptations from training occur when you rest after you train. No rest, no adaptation.
So as you swim your 200s this year focusing on the 1:55 goal, don't get discouraged if improvement doesn't seem contiuous or proportional to the work you are putting in, and you don't reach the goal before the end of the duel meets. At your age and current times, the taper can produce huge time drops in a 200, provided you've worked to improve your technique and worked hard in your training sets. Good luck and most importantly enjoy the journey.
