How do I increase my sprint distance?

First,check out this thread- forums.usms.org/showthread.php . Second,one of us is confused about the meaning of sprint.To me sprint is AFAP,all out.No body can sprint a 100 fly. One can do 100 fly repeats at 200 pace maybe,or 50 flys at 100 pace,maybe. There is a reason Ultra Short Race Pace is ultra short.If one is going to do repeats on 15-20 sec rest at race pace it must be short. If you are going to try for 50s at 100 pace I think the consensus on this forum is you need more rest and then it is HIT(High Intensity Training.) When I do 50s BR at 100 pace it is 50 swim,100-150 recovery swim.

First,check out this thread- forums.usms.org/showthread.php . Second,one of us is confused about the meaning of sprint.To me sprint is AFAP,all out.No body can sprint a 100 fly. One can do 100 fly repeats at 200 pace maybe,or 50 flys at 100 pace,maybe. There is a reason Ultra Short Race Pace is ultra short.If one is going to do repeats on 15-20 sec rest at race pace it must be short. If you are going to try for 50s at 100 pace I think the consensus on this forum is you need more rest and then it is HIT(High Intensity Training.) When I do 50s BR at 100 pace it is 50 swim,100-150 recovery swim. Thanks, Allen. Will definitely read that thread! Honestly, I would be happy if I could just do 50yd fly with the last 25 a sprint. But just going through the motions of the stroke tires me out.

Another technique to lengthen your fly sprint pace is to practice in a long-course pool. Ande's Austin team probably does plenty of long-course workouts. Learning to sustain a race pace over 164 feet, not 75, before turning around or resting is a total gamechanger. Hi Woofus! :wave:This is excellent advice that I took from you in the past. Judester, if you can do this, it really helps not having those walls to assist you! I don't have access to a long course pool; however, we have two pools in my community: An indoor 25-yard pool and an outdoor recreational pool with a free-form shape that has a two-lane, 25-yard lap pool as one offshoot. It is hard to measure the total length from end to end; however, when I count my 200-pace fly stroke, it takes me 25 strokes to complete the length. (I have to make a sharp turn halfway down the pool, but it's worth it!) In all, I figured the length is 62 yards based on my fly stroke count, so I have been practicing "200 fly" races by "racing" four lengths of the pool non-stop. The "race" works out to be well over 200 meters, so it is giving me the confidence for my upcoming 200m fly races in Saturday's meet, Worlds, and Nationals. Good luck! :cheerleader:

Hi Judester, I live in Martindale just outside of San Marcos. What are your goals? Tell us more about you, your back ground and how often you're training per week and how far per practice. Are you just training to train or are you preparing for a meet? The best thing you could do is come to Austin and train with Longhorn Masters. Ande So... I've incorporated butterfly sprints into my workout. When I first started, about 3 months ago, I could do one 25yd fly sprint about every 3 minutes (because it took me that long to recover). Later on, I was able to do five intervals of 25yd of fly sprint + 25yd back kick (relaxed), with a 60 second rest in between each interval. Now, I can do ten intervals of 25yd fly sprint + 25yd back kick (relaxed) without resting in between each interval. My long-term goal is to increase my fly sprint distance to 100yd per interval (I haven't decided on how many intervals yet). My short-term goal is to increase it to 50yd per interval. My problem is that I still can't break 25yd. Twenty-five yards of fly sprint kills me every time. The only difference seems to be in the amount of time it takes me to recover from each interval and begin the next. Anyone have any suggestions? I would greatly appreciate them. I know I'm doing something right because I can do more intervals without resting than I could before but I just can't figure out why I'm still near death at the end of each 25yd sprint.

Hi Judester, It sounds like you're making rapid improvement, if your recovery period after a 25y sprint is steadily decreasing. Your question is how to sustain that 25y pace for more than one length. Allen is correct to observe that, especially in fly, your pace over two, four, or eight short-course lengths will not ever be the same as over simply one length. In fly, the air is always coming out of the balloon. This is observable in even the most elite flyers in the world. Here is one technique you might try to have the 50, 100 and 200 fly paces not fall off dramatically from a 25y sprint. The key is to try to establish fairly uniform paces for the different race distances, so that for any given distance, the times per length are quite similar. To do that, I would start by manipulating the number of fly strokes you use per length, and not worry about watching the clock for right now. For example, suppose you typically use x strokes for a 25y fly sprint. Try getting comfortable using x-1 strokes for a 50y set, then a 75, 100, 125, etc., so that you can sustain a number of consecutive lengths at x-1. For a 200, you might find yourself dropping back to x-2 for some middle lengths. That is not always such a bad thing, as you may be learning how to get greater distance per stroke, with perhaps less exhaustion. As your x-1 sets lengthen, you can then go back to doing x sprint sets, only now those sets will last longer than one length. Eventually x will become your standard fly stroke count over longer and longer distances. Another technique to lengthen your fly sprint pace is to practice in a long-course pool. Ande's Austin team probably does plenty of long-course workouts. Learning to sustain a race pace over 164 feet, not 75, before turning around or resting is a total gamechanger. I once heard an elite swimmer refer to short-course as "assisted swimming," and while the expression jarred me at first, I came to see her point: practice long-course wherever possible. It's qualitatively harder, especially for fly, and will make short-course seem a lot easier. Good luck and have fun. Fly is certainly swimming's "final frontier."

I got to the pool early today and saw the kids practicing. Some of the younger swimmers were getting fatigued while swimming butterfly. When this happened they would switch to one-arm fly, they made it look easy. www.youtube.com/watch

Are you trying to be a sprinter or a 200 flyer? the 50 & 200 are not the same pace or stroke at all in most of us. Yes - work on 25's for speed to better in a 50 do not expect to hold that for 100 & 200.

I'll echo the advice here with some workout ideas. I have two different flys... one is 25 sprint, which I can sometimes maintain for 50 with a good push-off in short course. The other is for everything over 50. I taught myself fly with the help of my swim buddies at the YMCA a little more than a year ago, and I love it, great cardio and muscle burn! When I'm training fly, I really focus on holding form and pace for the 200, because my sprint speed is never going to be that great, but very rarely swim the full 200 fly all at once... To work on the sprint speed, my swim partners and I like 20 x 25 on :45. 500-worth of fly in 15:00. Nice round numbers. Then to work on the longer stuff (which is what I like to do personally): 10-20 x 50 on 1:10... but you have to do these in 200 pace. At my 200 pace this interval gives me a little more than 20 secs rest, which doesn't sound like much, but I'm not sprinting all out, obviously, and I'm really slow which keeps the intensity lower. Another set I like, to get used to 200 race pace, is 4 x 50 on 1:00 (shorter rests, so I really feel the burn at the end of the last couple of 50s); follow with 100-200 recovery swims and you can repeat the set as many times as you want. I do sets with 100s too, but really only counting strokes, not paying attention to time, after push I go 5-6 strokes in the first 25, then try to hold 7 strokes for the next 3 lengths. These will be slower than 200 pace, but it helps stretch things out which you really have to do for 200. And, yes, long course really helps to stretch it out. Today I did my first LCM workout since last summer and did a couple 200 IMs... painful without the turn. I counted strokes on the fly and was at 14-15 for the length, but really stretching... it's tough when you get used to going no more than 6-7 strokes without a turn and push.

Thanks for all your replies! A lot has happened since I last posted. First, I decided to drop the sprints for now and just work on building my endurance for a paced fly. Since I last posted this thread, I did manage to increase my fly to 50 yards. I had quite a revelation! I realized that if my mind is already set to do a 50, my body automatically adjusts to the first 25 by relaxing a bit. Before then, my attitude was "I'll try to keep going an extra length if I survive the first." My attitude should have been "I'm gonna swim 50 fly." I couldn't believe how easy that first 25 was when I had my mind set on a 50! So, I started doing 10 x 75 (50 fly, 25 back kick). Today, I'm up to 4 x 100 (75 fly, 25 very slow back kick). All flies are now paced, of course. Ande! You're so close to me! I'm actually considering the Longhorns. I need to fire off an email to the coach. I swam on the swim team (summers) from about 6 to 12 years old. I stopped swimming up until about 5 months ago. I had gained a ton of weight (into the morbidly obese category) over the years but have lost 98 lbs (still have 25lbs to lose) since November through diet and swimming. If it weren't for swimming, I don't think I would have been nearly as successful getting my health back in shape. Fly was my worst stroke as a child which is why I'm doing it now.