Hello Swim friends! Back in 2007 Ande posted the below Swimming Tip to his blog. It concerns split differentials in the 50 yard freestyle. As you can see, among top swimmers, the first 25 yards is roughly .5 faster than the second 25. Remove the dive, and in many cases the second 25 is probably faster than the first among the elite swimmers
My 50 yard free is far more lop sided - usually the first 25 is roughly 1.5 seconds faster than the first. It never really occurred to me that I was doing something wrong. I'd like to access your wisdom...how do you swim the 50? Are the first 4-5 strokes sub-maximal, and then all out the rest of the way?
Thank you for your help, and thank you to Ande for his challenging posts!
Ande's Swimming Tips:
Swim Faster Faster
Tip 172 Split Differentials for the 50 Free Short Course
I've written about the importance of correct splitting in other swim faster faster tips, but let's drill down and take a close look at how to correctly split the short course 50 free.
Study the 50 free split differentials of each swimmer
You calculate split differentials by
subtracting a swimmers 2nd 25 time from his first 25 time
2nd 25 time - 1st 25 time = split differential
Here are the final results for the 50 free finals in the
2007 NCAA Division I Women's Swimming & Diving Championships
1 Joyce, Kara Lynn 21.71 10.63 11.08 diff = 0.45
2 Jackson, Lara 21.73 10.64 11.09 diff = 0.45
3 Nymeyer, Lacey 21.80 10.62 11.18 diff = 0.56
4 Silver, Emily 21.99 10.82 11.17 diff = 0.35
5 Bishop, Brooke 22.17 10.85 11.32 diff = 0.47
5 Aljand, Triin 22.17 10.90 11.27 diff = 0.47
7 Bradford, Jenny 22.23 10.60 11.63 diff = 1.03
8 Denby, Kara 22.41 10.79 11.62 diff = 0.83
Here are the final results for the 50 free finals in the
2007 NCAA Division I Men's Swimming & Diving Championships
Event 4 Men 50 Yard Freestyle
1 Cielo, Cesar 18.69 9.14 9.55 diff = 0.41
2 Targett, Matt 19.08 9.29 9.79 diff = 0.50
2 Wildman-Tobriner, Ben 19.08 9.39 9.69 diff = 0.30
2 Subirats, Albert 19.08 9.30 9.78 diff = 0.48
5 Goodrich, Scott 19.29 9.35 9.94 diff = 0.59
6 Weber-Gale, Garrett 19.33 9.49 9.84 diff = 0.35
7 Tsagkarakis, Apostol 19.48 9.32 10.16 diff = 0.84
8 Lundquist, Bryan 19.49 9.54 9.95 diff = 0.41
Ideal Split Differential
It looks like around 0.30 - 0.40 of is the ideal split differential for the short course 50 free.
Swimmers should target their 50 free splits in the a range of 0.25 - 0.60.
If a swimmer has a differential of 0.60 or more, she probably worked her first 25 a bit too hard or maybe had a bad turn or push off.
Sadly enough, even in a 50, you may not swim your fastest time by
going all out from the get go, you need to be swimming close to all out, hit a great turn, have an excellent streamline breakout
When Fred Bousquets went 18.74
His splits were 9.26 9.48
so his differential was only 0.22!
When Cesar Cielo went 18.69
his splits were 9.14 9.55
so his differential was 0.41.
One excellent swimmer told me that when he races the 50 free
the first 2 strokes in his breakout are at about 80% effort,
since he's already going fast from his dive.
Parents
Former Member
Thanks for the question! I take one breath for a 50 yard freestyle. I will say this, my training until recently has been very race-pace oriented, without a lot of aerobic base "underneath" so to speak. I've recently gone on an aerobic kick for the past several months, and I'm curious what that might do when I switch to race pace training next February or so. Perhaps the elite sprintes bring the 50 home so fast because they have such a sound aerobic base, and I do not.
I'm not sure the aerobic energy system really comes into it on a 50 yard bash. You are principally using your anaerobic (ATP) energy systems, depending on how long the 50 yard sprint takes you of course. There is a good article here, on energy systems used during different stages of a race:
www.brianmac.co.uk/energy.htm
While you shouldn't really hold back, certainly not a 50 yard sprint, I do believe it's possible to 'die' on a 50M sprint. If swimmers didn't slow down on a 50 then the race would be decided at 25M, especially LC, but how many races do we see where swimmers lose it in the last 10M? If you tense up and absolutely bash the first 25, like you are swimming a 25 sprint only (eyeballs out), then depending on your own conditioning, those last 10M can hurt like hell. I know, I've experienced it a few times. The key is to get out fast but under control. Don't feel like you're straining until the last 10M.
Some elite track sprinters 'die' on the 100M and they are only running for
Thanks for the question! I take one breath for a 50 yard freestyle. I will say this, my training until recently has been very race-pace oriented, without a lot of aerobic base "underneath" so to speak. I've recently gone on an aerobic kick for the past several months, and I'm curious what that might do when I switch to race pace training next February or so. Perhaps the elite sprintes bring the 50 home so fast because they have such a sound aerobic base, and I do not.
I'm not sure the aerobic energy system really comes into it on a 50 yard bash. You are principally using your anaerobic (ATP) energy systems, depending on how long the 50 yard sprint takes you of course. There is a good article here, on energy systems used during different stages of a race:
www.brianmac.co.uk/energy.htm
While you shouldn't really hold back, certainly not a 50 yard sprint, I do believe it's possible to 'die' on a 50M sprint. If swimmers didn't slow down on a 50 then the race would be decided at 25M, especially LC, but how many races do we see where swimmers lose it in the last 10M? If you tense up and absolutely bash the first 25, like you are swimming a 25 sprint only (eyeballs out), then depending on your own conditioning, those last 10M can hurt like hell. I know, I've experienced it a few times. The key is to get out fast but under control. Don't feel like you're straining until the last 10M.
Some elite track sprinters 'die' on the 100M and they are only running for
