Hi,
I am 24 and, while I grew up swimming, it has been some time since I swam on a regular basis. I can remember some workouts/drills from middle/early high school, but much of that has faded from memory.
For the last 2 weeks, I've been going 3x a week, swimming between 45 minutes and 1 hour at a time doing a mix of strokes, kick, and pull drills (w/ exception of butterfly -- I will attempt that when I'm a bit more fit.) I have remained in shape through other activities and I'm able to swim comfortably for 1 hour. I can feel myself getting stronger every time I hit the pool but I realize I have a ways to go.
I was wondering if anyone has advice for evaluating my current swimming-fitness level. What are some helpful drills/measures of speed and endurance that I can use to evaluate how I might to improve? Any advice of how often and for how long I should train? Starter workouts would be helpful too, but I don't want to ask for too much :blush:
I'd definitely like to be "better than average" for my age/gender. Any advice as to what that looks like and how to get me there?
A bit more information:
Age: 24
Height: 5'9"
Weight: 143 lbs
Occupation: grad student
Thanks and best wishes
... I was wondering if anyone has advice for evaluating my current swimming-fitness level ...
Many swimmers use what are called "test sets" or "reference sets" to measure current fitness. The idea is to pick a distance, interval, and stroke that's challenging and meaningful to you, then do the set every so often. You can use the times you achieve in the set as a measure of fitness.
My favorite reference set is very simple. 5 x 100 free on 1:30, best average. A couple of years ago, I was happy to make 1:12 - 1:13 on all intervals. Now I can hit 1:08 - 1:09. I'm far from the fastest guy in the pool, but since I've been tracking this set, I know I've made progress.
Early in 2012, pwb posted this (as part of a longer workout),
Workout #1 = 3 x 300 Test Set
I got the main focus of this workout, the 3 x 300 test set, from Dave Salo’s lovely book, Complete Conditioning for Swimming. The end goal is to determine your threshold pace, the maximum pace you can sustain over a steady, constant pace swim. I’ve been doing this set for the last couple of years and have found it useful for:
* Setting intervals
* Setting target times in workout,
* As a good predictor of my in-season pacing on distance events at meets
Test Set (1200 set / 2900 total):
3 x 300: free
* The goal is swim hard, but to even / perfect split each one and to be consistent across the 300s.
* Set an interval after #1 that gives you about 45 to 60 seconds rest.
* Define your BASE interval as the average 100 pace across these 300s rounded up to the nearest 10 seconds. For example, when I’m feeling great, I do my 300s around 3:30 to 3:35 in SCM, so my Threshold pace is about 1:11/1:12 and my BASE interval is 1:20
That's the idea. Good luck!
... I was wondering if anyone has advice for evaluating my current swimming-fitness level ...
Many swimmers use what are called "test sets" or "reference sets" to measure current fitness. The idea is to pick a distance, interval, and stroke that's challenging and meaningful to you, then do the set every so often. You can use the times you achieve in the set as a measure of fitness.
My favorite reference set is very simple. 5 x 100 free on 1:30, best average. A couple of years ago, I was happy to make 1:12 - 1:13 on all intervals. Now I can hit 1:08 - 1:09. I'm far from the fastest guy in the pool, but since I've been tracking this set, I know I've made progress.
Early in 2012, pwb posted this (as part of a longer workout),
Workout #1 = 3 x 300 Test Set
I got the main focus of this workout, the 3 x 300 test set, from Dave Salo’s lovely book, Complete Conditioning for Swimming. The end goal is to determine your threshold pace, the maximum pace you can sustain over a steady, constant pace swim. I’ve been doing this set for the last couple of years and have found it useful for:
* Setting intervals
* Setting target times in workout,
* As a good predictor of my in-season pacing on distance events at meets
Test Set (1200 set / 2900 total):
3 x 300: free
* The goal is swim hard, but to even / perfect split each one and to be consistent across the 300s.
* Set an interval after #1 that gives you about 45 to 60 seconds rest.
* Define your BASE interval as the average 100 pace across these 300s rounded up to the nearest 10 seconds. For example, when I’m feeling great, I do my 300s around 3:30 to 3:35 in SCM, so my Threshold pace is about 1:11/1:12 and my BASE interval is 1:20
That's the idea. Good luck!
