I'm curious what my fellow slow twitchers do to train for the longest pool events. Of particular interest is input from those of you who also swam as a youth. With way less yardage that you used to do, what can be done to be able to survive a decent mile?
In my case, workouts are limited to an hour and there are usually 3+ per lane, so sets can't be dedicated just to my interests. However, the coaches are quite willing to do what they can for me.
I had a really unpleasant weekend where I raced a 1500 on Friday. I faded a bit and the struggle trying to maintain pace really drained me. In fact, I was really stiff and sore the next day (mainly my lats). I had to kill myself in the 800 on Sat. just to match my 800 split from the previous day. I was still stiff on Sunday.
Monday night, I finally felt recovered from that 1500. Coach had us do a 500 right after warmup. Since I was feeling pretty good, I pushed it, hard. My time in that practice 500 converts to a 400 SCM 5 seconds faster than what I did in the meet on Sunday. I don't know if that's encouraging or depressing. :lmao:
Former Member
I think what works best for training distance is 1. pace sets with a decent amount of rest (like the 15x100 on 1:30 I mentioned before) and 2. long sets with hardly any rest. Obviously this second type of set can't be done anywhere near race pace. This is a threshold pace type set. For me that's at least five seconds slower per hundred than my pace. I think 1500 yards/meters is a bare minimum for this kind of set.
I do a fair amount of the 1st type of set, but very little of the 2nd. I definitely think that is what's missing. In 2009 I would occasionally do sets like 6x500, 4x800, etc. At Nationals that year I did the 1000/1650 same day double and survived OK.
Sounds like you need to adjust your race strategy just a little bit. Of course you run the risk of taking it out too slow, but I would back off a tad early in the race. Try and negative split your next distance event.
I always even or negative split. Even the 800 and 400 races after I was obliterated from the 1500 were both negative split. They were just a lot slower than I wanted. Like Kirk touched on, I think the issue is just not enough solid distance work.
It's not like I went out too fast and died. I did a sensible first 500, tried to accelerate from there, but couldn't hold that pace.
SCM
01:10.5
01:13.1
01:13.8
01:14.0
01:13.2
01:12.5
01:12.5
01:12.8
01:13.2
01:14.3
01:14.3
01:14.4
01:15.3
01:15.0
01:13.6
My short answer -- I can't train enough these days to really race an 800/1000 or 1500/1650 (e.g., my weekly average yardage thus far this year is slightly under 20K, usually done through 4-5 workouts a week of about 45-75 minutes). Moreover, when I do race them, they wipe me for the rest of the meet. I had almost the same experience as you this summer at Nationals when I raced the 800 on Thursday of the meet and then was wasted the rest of the weekend.
Unless you can increase your training, my main advice would be to pick a meet where you ONLY focus on the 800 and 1500 ... and preferably get to swim the 800 one or two days before the 1500. If you must get other events in to get your money's worth for the weekend, pick some shorter events just for fun. Then, find another meet later in the season where you can focus on the 200 to 500 distances. I admit that it is practically impossible to do this in the LCM or SCM season, but the SCY season -- assuming you're going to Nationals -- should allow you to focus on the 1000/1650 for a Feb/March 'taper' meet and then aim for fast 200 to 500s at Nationals.
That's my plan, at least, because I don't see my time available to train increasing until I retire!
Thanks,
I was kind of thinking the same thing. If I want to do a good 400/500, don't do anther tough race first, even a few days before. If I want to do a decent 800 or longer, don't plan on being useful for several days afterwards.
Great thread - I'm planning on doing my first mile (1500 scm) in a month, so this is great. :bliss:
Agreed! Great stuff! I plan on swimming the 1650 at Auburn, in February; my first opportunity to try that event out.
I am a breaststroke sprinter with the 50 breaststroke as my best event. And, I will never give it up. But, I keep hearing my coach say, "Another sign of a distance swimmer...", when he sees my splits improve towards the end of our distance freestyle training that we do together on Thursdays. Between my 900 and 2000 fly, hearing my coaches constant, "Another sign of a distance swimmer" comments, and having a blast swimming my first 3K open water swim and then running right back out to join the 1k group, I think I am now convinced this is where I belong. :D (Hopefully, my body will hold up!)
I swam with the age-groupers today, we did a set that I think is good for distance training.
I like it!
We do sets somewhat similar to this most Wednesdays. The difference is we'll do a long swim (say 1000-1500) and then follow it up with a series of fast 50s where you try to hold your 500 pace. Then we'll repeat the entire thing a couple times.
I find it difficult to change gears so abruptly. With the set you did you build into it more and I think that would help me. Then again maybe changing gears abruptly is something worth practicing.
If my mile pace is 1:36/100 (I think that's what it was this summer), using your model above should I be doing 1. 15 x 100 on 1:50-2:00 and 2. 15 x 100 on 1:40?
I think for the first set 2:00 would be good. 1:50 would be really difficult. If you can make that you could probably hold a faster pace than 1:36. The second one should also be very challenging. I know I can't hold repeats within five seconds of my pace. You might want to start with 1:45 and move to 1:40 if you're able to make the 1:45 "easily."
This is a good topic. I pretty much agree with knelson on everything. I have been in super grinder mode for about six weeks now. Today we decided to do a 4500 workout that was pretty much all technique work to try to make sure the tedium hadn't destroyed good form. I've actually never done this much technique work and was a bit skeptical. But, I have to say, it was one of the best workouts we've ever done.
Slow, I have a fartlek swim that I do quite a bit:
Noah's Ark: 500 continuous swim where: 25 DPS/25 Fast, 50/50, 75/75, 100/100 (I usually do the 75 pair as Backstroke, the rest as Freestyle)
Two by two, get it? I've gone so far as to string six together for a 3k (yd) timed swim. :bed:
