How do I stack up, and how can I improve?

You just started swimming. It sounds like you had time trials on your very first day, or close to it, so 42 seconds is pretty good. So is your sweet 4.5 second drop. The closest times I have to when I started swimming competitively are from the last day of January '09. I started at the beginning of that month. I would love to have the data that comes from knowing exactly where I was, beginning on that very first day. Don't worry about how you stack up. Just focus on you, no one else. You can't control what everyone else does.

I'm a sophomore in high school, and although I had no experience swimming competitively, I decided to go out for my school team (my school is so small that they don't cut for any sports). At the beginning of the season (about two weeks ago), we had time trials for the team. In that time trial, my time for 50 yard freestyle was 42.0 seconds. Yesterday, in the season's second meet, I swam competitively for the first time. I swam third in the 200 yard freestyle relay, and my individual time was 37.6 seconds. How do I stack up, and how can I improve? Thank you. By the end of the year try to get your 50 down to 30 seconds. That's about a time you should shoot for your first if you wanna be good at a 50 :D Also don't be afraid to try other events. I know in my league, theses only 11 in the whole league who can finish a hundred butterfly. If your league is similar to mine, try to finish a 100 butterfly and you will be guaranteed to contribute at least 1 point to the team! Does your high school have varvee?? varvee.com Also I want to see you do a 500 freestyle at a meet! That mental block is definitely one way to get fast quick.

I'm a sophomore in high school ... 37.6 seconds. I can honestly say I know how that feels. I started swimming competitively in the summer before my sophomore year of high school, and in my first meet in our summer league, I went :35 for the 50 free, enough for second place in a meet against two small and unserious teams. As it turns out, swimming's a sport that rewards effort as well as ability. And, keep in mind that, in swimming, sooner or later everyone loses: the people who enjoy swimming the most are those who are in it for more than the blue ribbons ...

As I see it, there is always someone out there that trains more than I do (in the pool and weights/drylands), has better coaching, and will whip me in a race. In high school it was all about winning, but that was 15 years ago for me. Now I train the best that I can given time/work/family obligations. I swim to better my times, and to see how I can improve with practices to swim faster. I like the idea of trying different events mentioned above - you might find that you are a natural at fly or *** and be able to rock those events. I never was able to pop out a super fast 50 free sprint like my brothers, so I looked to do the best with the abilities and tendencies that I have (backstroke clicks better for me). Still working on doing that today! Best of luck as you improve your times with more training! :groovy:

I'm a sophomore in high school, and although I had no experience swimming competitively, I decided to go out for my school team (my school is so small that they don't cut for any sports). At the beginning of the season (about two weeks ago), we had time trials for the team. In that time trial, my time for 50 yard freestyle was 42.0 seconds. Yesterday, in the season's second meet, I swam competitively for the first time. I swam third in the 200 yard freestyle relay, and my individual time was 37.6 seconds. How do I stack up, and how can I improve? Thank you. Don't worry about how you stack up If you love it Keep training hard You will swim faster faster U.S. Masters Swimming Discussion Forums - View Single Post - Ande's Swimming Tips: Swimming Faster Faster

Try to get your coach to look at your stroke and find out what needs improvement. Starts and turns are also important, especially in a 50. Once you've got a good flip turn down, use it 100% of the time in practice. It will take a while to incorporate it completely, but if you stick with it it'll happen. Weights will help if you're not lifting. I'd also suggest incorporating chins, squat jumps, and jumping rope. The chins will build strength in your arms and back, the squat jumps and jumping rope will help prepare your legs for starts and turns. The number of reps and sets can be determined by what you can do initially, just keep a record (log book) of what you do, and try to improve the rep count each time. I'm of the opinion that one can improve by working out once or twice a week, and it's more important to have more days of recovery than lifting per week. If you can do 3-4 sets of 10-20 chins then you should be plenty strong for sprinting. Ditto with the squat jumps. Try to practice sprinting once or twice a week. Could be done during your warm-up or cool-down, just be sure you're adequately warmed up at the beginning, and not too worn out if you do it at the end. Work your flutter kick as much as possible. Your team should do some kick sets, put 100% effort into those when you do them. All the really good sprinters I've seen have a crazy monster kick, so I think this is a key element. It's not the only thing, but it does matter. Also, get used to kicking more during practice. You won't be able to kick 100% all the time, but the more you think about it the more kicking you will do. If you're able to dolphin kick effectively, try practicing that off the start and turns. Some people go faster with dolphin kicking, others do better flutter kicking. Experiment and see what works best for you. I've seen fast sprinters use 3-8 dolphin kicks and it's pretty cool to watch, but it needs to be faster than flutter kicking, otherwise you don't want to do it. Second to last thing I'd say is prepare your mind to race. To me, sprinting has a lot to do with attitude. Prepare yourself mentally to race fast and you will, prepare yourself to race slow and you will. A 50 is so short that you probably won't have time to think about it, other than right before the start and right at the end, everything else is a bit of a blur. Sometimes it helps me to set a tempo in my head for my stroke rate, but other than that I don't think about much during the race. Finally, I'd say that since you're a Sophomore, you've got a good two years to make some great improvements, and it can certainly be done. Decide that you want to drop 10-15 seconds by the same time next year, and work toward that goal. The fact that you're new to competitive swimming is in your favor, it's far easier to drop seconds when learning something new, than it is when you're fast and working on refinements to get slightly faster. Good luck. :banana: