I've been focusing on stroke work for the past year or so and I'm hitting on a phase I'm hoping others have hit and have answers to.
My 75-85% efforts are when my stroke is best but 1) It seems to fall apart when I really put the pedal to the metal and 2) If I try to slow down to build endurance, the stroke also does not stay together. If I can't maintain stroke mechanics during peak sprints or cardio/muscular endurance sets would that amount to garbage yardage?
This funky middle ground means I get some decent effort in practice, but it seems too short compared to other swimmers workouts. Without building power or endurance using 'the right stroke' I worry that I'm not really making as good of progress as I can.
Thanks in advance.
If I can't maintain stroke mechanics during peak sprints or cardio/muscular endurance sets would that amount to garbage yardage?
My answer would be "no," but I can imagine others might disagree. I think just about everyone can relate to this. At some point, if you are working hard, you won't be able to maintain your stroke technique. But I think you still need to push yourself to this level and not merely back off when your stroke starts to fall apart. You just need to keep emphasizing good technique when you are able to and hopefully you'll start to increase the speed where the technique drop-off occurs and be able to go farther into your workout before the drop-off occurs.
If I can't maintain stroke mechanics during peak sprints or cardio/muscular endurance sets would that amount to garbage yardage?
My answer would be "no," but I can imagine others might disagree. I think just about everyone can relate to this. At some point, if you are working hard, you won't be able to maintain your stroke technique. But I think you still need to push yourself to this level and not merely back off when your stroke starts to fall apart. You just need to keep emphasizing good technique when you are able to and hopefully you'll start to increase the speed where the technique drop-off occurs and be able to go farther into your workout before the drop-off occurs.
