In my most recent blog entry, "One Man's Garbage..." forums.usms.org/blog.php , I asked my fellow swimmers their respective opinions on the impact long, slow, continuous swimming has on meet performance.
The expression "garbage yards" (and the pejorative overtones such a phrase conjurs) has become so embedded in the forum lexicon that many, I suspect, now consider as indisputable truth swimming this way is a waste of time for anyone with competitive ambitions.
Such a view appears particularly well-entrenched among the many non-credentialed exercise physiology pontificators here on the forums who also have a fondness for sprinting and dry land exercise.
But is the concept of garbage yards truly valid--or a kind of urban legend made up largely by sprinters who would rather be doing something other than spending 90 minutes without stopping in the pool?
I don't mean only practicing this way. But if you are, like me, inclined to enjoy swimming, once or twice a week, long, slow, relatively relaxing, continuous yards, do you believe (and more importantly, perhaps, have any evidence to bolster said belief) that so-called "garbage yards" can have some value for actual racing?
Or do these only teach your body to swim slow?
I invite you to read my recent blog forums.usms.org/blog.php and post your thoughts advice there or here.
At the risk of provoking censure by the forum authorities, I furthermore ask you to leave all civility by the wayside.
Feel free to trash talk and smack upside the head of any and every one who disagrees with your personal bias here!
It's been way too long since these forums have had a good, old-fashioned range war of opinions run amuk and ad hominem attacks!
Go at each other tooth and claw. It will only stir the blood of us all, I say--something we garbage yard enthusiasts probably need a bit more of, I will admit.
My constant battle in practices is to be able to push myself far enough into the "discomfort" zone. It takes physical energy and emotional energy....Unfortunately the rest of my life (work, children, etc.) often requires that energy so I settle for leaving a little in the tank and not pushing to a highly uncomfortable stage of swimming. When I do have the luxury of pushing that hard (and most likely napping a couple of hours after the workout), and can summon the focus.....well, that is when I have seen my biggest gains in my times.
Dale, you make excellent points. I agree with you that without "discomfort" in practice, you won't swim at your peak in meets. My measure of discomfort in practice is pretty visceral: I like to feel my stomach contents entering the esophagus but not quite reaching the mouth and beyond. My lanemates appreciate this nod to etiquette.
I suppose my question is not so much an either/or kind of thing--i.e., long continuous yards at a reasonably humane pace, or interval training with plenty of peri-vomit-inducing periods of discomfort. I assume you must do the latter to swim your best in meets. My question is can the former help you do the latter? Or would you be better off just taking more rest days?
I've been experimenting this year (2012) with the hypothesis that garbage yards on the off days actually helps swimming performance, assuming they are not a replacement for hard swimming during regular practices.
As of yesterday, I am up to 85.28 miles this year, which for me is a lot; I have also swum every day in February, for a total of 43.49 miles as of yesterday, again, a lot for me.
My first "test" of whether this is helping came yesterday, when I did the 200 free at one of our little local meets. It was in a 5-lane, very shallow pool, and I raced at the tail end of a 16.09 mile swimming week. The 200 was my 4th event in around 2 hours, but I still managed a 2:00.07, which is a good mid-season time for me, and a 1.5 sec. drop from the last time I swam it (before the garbage yardage off-day swimming regimen began).
So Test #1 was a tentative pass.
Test #2 comes next Sunday, when I swim the 1650. I will keep you posted if I am not in the ICU.
I think that you have to workout continuously for a long enough period of time for your heart, lungs and muscles to develope the capacity to work efficiently for long periods of time. Doing this will enable your body to handle the stress of hard training and racing. I can not think of any reason that this can not be accomplished by continuous long swims. I don't think it makes any difference to your body whether you swim 10x200 at 2:40 or just swim 2000 yards holding a 2:40 pace every 200 and just not stopping every 200 yards. You don't stop every 200 yards when you race, do you?
I think that you have to do some sprinting during every workout, but if you intend to compete in events of 200M or more you need at least as much endurance as speed. The longer the event is the more important endurance becomes as a factor in your success.
You also need to swim some of your yardage at a pace similar to your race pace and you have to do enough yardage at that pace to get used to that level of effort and the anaerobic fatigue that you feel when you race. I don't think that the hard yardage has to be the majority of your workout or even has to be done everyday.
I do agree that you can not train effectively by swimming only at a "garbage yardage" pace. If you don't develope the ability to sprint, you will find yourself getting passed on the last lap by the swimmers who are in good enough shape to hang with you and have developed the speed to pull away from you at the end of the race.:canada:
Absolutely agree. I look at it this way: the body has all sorts of subsets of fast and slow twitch fibers. Sprinters really don't need too much of the latter, especially those who only do 50s. (I would argue that for 100s, you absolutely do need some aerobic conditioning, too.) Actually, swimming really does not have any events that are all-out anaerobic. You burn thru all the substrates for this within 8 seconds or so, if I recall correctly. Track has the 100 meters, and football coaches the 60 meters, which are pretty close to all out sprints. But until they include the 25 yard freestyle, there is no 100 percent pure sprint in swimming.
Anyhow, I think long swimming is particularly good for establishing the base you can call upon when all else has started to fail... Even sprinters like Leslie can benefit, if for no other reason than to clear out byproducts of anaerobic metabolism and allow them to concentrate on stroke mechanics.
I suspect the original question is about whether lots of low intensity yardage helps pool racing performance. If so, then people who do more yardage should be kicking butt in races.
I don't know if any of these people race, but the top 200 should be able to race a lot faster than me.
www.usms.org/.../gtdparticipants.php
Keith, in scrolling down the list, I actually recognize a number of great swimmers, many of whom are regular posters here on the forums.
Shirley A Loftus-Charley
David J Barra
Jim Mc Conica
Thomas J Patterson
Christopher A LaBianco
Are just a few of the top-mileage greats that I recognize within our ranks.
My constant battle in practices is to be able to push myself far enough into the "discomfort" zone. It takes physical energy and emotional energy....Unfortunately the rest of my life (work, children, etc.) often requires that energy so I settle for leaving a little in the tank and not pushing to a highly uncomfortable stage of swimming. When I do have the luxury of pushing that hard (and most likely napping a couple of hours after the workout), and can summon the focus.....well, that is when I have seen my biggest gains in my times.
Dale, you make excellent points. I agree with you that without "discomfort" in practice, you won't swim at your peak in meets. My measure of discomfort in practice is pretty visceral: I like to feel my stomach contents entering the esophagus but not quite reaching the mouth and beyond. My lanemates appreciate this nod to etiquette.
I suppose my question is not so much an either/or kind of thing--i.e., long continuous yards at a reasonably humane pace, or interval training with plenty of peri-vomit-inducing periods of discomfort. I assume you must do the latter to swim your best in meets. My question is can the former help you do the latter? Or would you be better off just taking more rest days?
I've been experimenting this year (2012) with the hypothesis that garbage yards on the off days actually helps swimming performance, assuming they are not a replacement for hard swimming during regular practices.
As of yesterday, I am up to 85.28 miles this year, which for me is a lot; I have also swum every day in February, for a total of 43.49 miles as of yesterday, again, a lot for me.
My first "test" of whether this is helping came yesterday, when I did the 200 free at one of our little local meets. It was in a 5-lane, very shallow pool, and I raced at the tail end of a 16.09 mile swimming week. The 200 was my 4th event in around 2 hours, but I still managed a 2:00.07, which is a good mid-season time for me, and a 1.5 sec. drop from the last time I swam it (before the garbage yardage off-day swimming regimen began).
So Test #1 was a tentative pass.
Test #2 comes next Sunday, when I swim the 1650. I will keep you posted if I am not in the ICU.
I think that you have to workout continuously for a long enough period of time for your heart, lungs and muscles to develope the capacity to work efficiently for long periods of time. Doing this will enable your body to handle the stress of hard training and racing. I can not think of any reason that this can not be accomplished by continuous long swims. I don't think it makes any difference to your body whether you swim 10x200 at 2:40 or just swim 2000 yards holding a 2:40 pace every 200 and just not stopping every 200 yards. You don't stop every 200 yards when you race, do you?
I think that you have to do some sprinting during every workout, but if you intend to compete in events of 200M or more you need at least as much endurance as speed. The longer the event is the more important endurance becomes as a factor in your success.
You also need to swim some of your yardage at a pace similar to your race pace and you have to do enough yardage at that pace to get used to that level of effort and the anaerobic fatigue that you feel when you race. I don't think that the hard yardage has to be the majority of your workout or even has to be done everyday.
I do agree that you can not train effectively by swimming only at a "garbage yardage" pace. If you don't develope the ability to sprint, you will find yourself getting passed on the last lap by the swimmers who are in good enough shape to hang with you and have developed the speed to pull away from you at the end of the race.:canada:
Absolutely agree. I look at it this way: the body has all sorts of subsets of fast and slow twitch fibers. Sprinters really don't need too much of the latter, especially those who only do 50s. (I would argue that for 100s, you absolutely do need some aerobic conditioning, too.) Actually, swimming really does not have any events that are all-out anaerobic. You burn thru all the substrates for this within 8 seconds or so, if I recall correctly. Track has the 100 meters, and football coaches the 60 meters, which are pretty close to all out sprints. But until they include the 25 yard freestyle, there is no 100 percent pure sprint in swimming.
Anyhow, I think long swimming is particularly good for establishing the base you can call upon when all else has started to fail... Even sprinters like Leslie can benefit, if for no other reason than to clear out byproducts of anaerobic metabolism and allow them to concentrate on stroke mechanics.
I suspect the original question is about whether lots of low intensity yardage helps pool racing performance. If so, then people who do more yardage should be kicking butt in races.
I don't know if any of these people race, but the top 200 should be able to race a lot faster than me.
www.usms.org/.../gtdparticipants.php
Keith, in scrolling down the list, I actually recognize a number of great swimmers, many of whom are regular posters here on the forums.
Shirley A Loftus-Charley
David J Barra
Jim Mc Conica
Thomas J Patterson
Christopher A LaBianco
Are just a few of the top-mileage greats that I recognize within our ranks.
