I raced at PNA Champs near Seattle this weekend and all of my times were much slower than last year even though I trained for 11 months straight (Masters swim 3 days/week, weight lifting 2-3 days/week, with some cross-country skiing and biking on weekends). I stopped lifting 2 weeks prior to the meet but I swam up until Thursday before the Sat/Sun meet. Mostly did sprints on the Tues-Thur swims before the meet, about 2k meters all-up vs 3k meters for a normal workout. Plenty of sleep time. But I felt tired during the meet and ran out of energy on most events (200/500 yd free, 50/100/200 ***). Age = 51.
Should I have tapered more? I have no idea what caused my fatigue.
Thanks for any thoughts.
Seattle Jack
I agree with what has been said so far. It could be that you didn't rest enough, but possibly you didn't train enough. Obviously you've exercised a lot, but three days per week 3K per session isn't a lot of actual swimming volume. My experience is that other forms of exercise don't necessarily translate to helping with your swimming training. You've got to put the time in at the pool and I think four days a week is the minimum. Your experience may vary, but that's mine. And how did you train? Were you training to race? If your goal in the 500 was, say, to break 7:00, did you hold repeat 50s under 42 seconds and repeat 100s under 1:24? Lastly, it is possible you just had a bad weekend. I've certainly had meets where I've trained hard, thought I was rested and ready to go, but just felt flat. It can happen.
I agree with what has been said so far. It could be that you didn't rest enough, but possibly you didn't train enough. Obviously you've exercised a lot, but three days per week 3K per session isn't a lot of actual swimming volume. My experience is that other forms of exercise don't necessarily translate to helping with your swimming training. You've got to put the time in at the pool and I think four days a week is the minimum. Your experience may vary, but that's mine. And how did you train? Were you training to race? If your goal in the 500 was, say, to break 7:00, did you hold repeat 50s under 42 seconds and repeat 100s under 1:24? Lastly, it is possible you just had a bad weekend. I've certainly had meets where I've trained hard, thought I was rested and ready to go, but just felt flat. It can happen.
