I have another question for all of you wise swimmers. I see the saying"to swim fast in a meet you need to swim fast in practice" or something like that. So, do I need to be swimming at race pace for each set that I do? Should I just make sure that I am swimming at say 80 or 90%? I'm not sure. I would have thought it would depend on the workout but what do I know? Any help would be appreciated. Thanks and hope you are having a good weekend!
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I've been doing a lot of that this year, and it's paid off, particularly for my 200s. When choosing a set, I like to ask myself, "What am I training for?" I do a lot of 4 x 50s back at 200 race pace, and N x 100 free at 500 or 1650 pace. I'm splitting my races better & swimming better times.
I do this too, and I agree it's very valuable training. You build anaerobic capacity (and/or aerobic, if the sets are for 800-1650) and you get great pacing practice. If you swim a set of 4x50 at 200 race pace and take it out too hard, you'll know by the last rep. And if you are too cautious, and drop two seconds on the last 50, you know you can go out faster.
For 200m events I do 3x(4x50 race pace + 100 easy) with 15-20 seconds rest on the 50s. For 200 and 100 I do 8x(50 race pace+100 easy), with 30-40 seconds rest after the 100. In this set I try to keep my target pace for the second 50 of a 100.
I do two or three sets like these a week. The rest is mostly endurance work, SDKs, kicking and shorter sprints (10-25).
For 800/1500 I do like Swimosaur - 6-15x100 with 10-15 seconds rest. I have a test set I use before meets; 8x100 on the 1:20. The combined times will usually be very close to my time for the 800 at the meet, and a 1500 will be close to the average 100 m time + 0,5-1,0 sec.
For this season I have decided to shift my focus from the 400-1500 events to the 200 free/400 IM. I'm still trying to figure out the optimal training for this. More speed work and more weights, is my guess, but how and how much?
I've been doing a lot of that this year, and it's paid off, particularly for my 200s. When choosing a set, I like to ask myself, "What am I training for?" I do a lot of 4 x 50s back at 200 race pace, and N x 100 free at 500 or 1650 pace. I'm splitting my races better & swimming better times.
I do this too, and I agree it's very valuable training. You build anaerobic capacity (and/or aerobic, if the sets are for 800-1650) and you get great pacing practice. If you swim a set of 4x50 at 200 race pace and take it out too hard, you'll know by the last rep. And if you are too cautious, and drop two seconds on the last 50, you know you can go out faster.
For 200m events I do 3x(4x50 race pace + 100 easy) with 15-20 seconds rest on the 50s. For 200 and 100 I do 8x(50 race pace+100 easy), with 30-40 seconds rest after the 100. In this set I try to keep my target pace for the second 50 of a 100.
I do two or three sets like these a week. The rest is mostly endurance work, SDKs, kicking and shorter sprints (10-25).
For 800/1500 I do like Swimosaur - 6-15x100 with 10-15 seconds rest. I have a test set I use before meets; 8x100 on the 1:20. The combined times will usually be very close to my time for the 800 at the meet, and a 1500 will be close to the average 100 m time + 0,5-1,0 sec.
For this season I have decided to shift my focus from the 400-1500 events to the 200 free/400 IM. I'm still trying to figure out the optimal training for this. More speed work and more weights, is my guess, but how and how much?
