Song in your head during practice?

Jean-- Your tape is a great idea. Maybe you and USMS should make a CD entitled Rousers #1 and sell it as a fund raiser. If it proves successful, you could follow up with Rousers #2, etc. Who knows? Maybe someday it will become standard to pipe Rousers #417, etc. into the underwater PA system at masters workouts nationwide. Doug--(Mr. Strong440--for some reason, I have in mind your name is Doug; forgive me if this isn't the case): You make an excellent point, too, about concentrating on some aspect of technique. I just got back from a brutal (for me) workout--5 x 100 on 1:25 warm up, followed by 6 x 500 on 6:30, followed by 1 x 200 sprint, a slow 100, and 6 x 50 on :40. I get so exhausted during this kind of thing that I find myself murmuring the word "peace" to myself as I plod back and forth, almost an attempt to induce a little transcendental-ly meditative state of mind to distance my self from the pain of distance... I think that for me the best thing to think about during swimming is pretty much nothing at all--I actually swim to silence my mind. Tchaikovsky's (spelling?) booming cannons are better than words.

Hey Jim That's a great question. The last time I sang to myself was probably during a workout some years ago, since these days I concentrate on only one thing each lap, an element of my stroke or breathing technique. However, I remember that I, too, searched for a long time. My Heart at Thy Sweet Voice from the opera Samson and Delilah was the last song I remember singing in my mind as I swam. In years past Sousa marches were my choices, much as with you and the 1812 Overture.

I don't hum to myself while I swim, but I do have a special tape I made for myself that I call "Rousers". I will play this tape when I am driving to a swim meet. The selections include things like the Grand March from Aida, the finale section of Saint Saen's Organ Symphony, Beethoven's Egmont Overture, the theme from Rocky, the theme from Chariots of Fire, something rousing from Phantom of the Opera (the one where the Phantom sings to Christine) etc. I don't think I have "War of 1812" on there, and that is a real oversight on my part. That is a real rousing piece of music.

I do usually sing during workouts ... but fall quickly into some one line rhythmic repeater. I just read The Waterproof Coach (by Thomas Denes). He advocates using a personal "Song-O-Meter" to determine your swimming pace. He writes, When you swim easy you should be able to sing your favorite song in your head without any problem. (That is, provided you have a favorite song to which you know the words.) When you swim at a moderate pace, you'll find yourself either forgetting some of the words or repeating the same refrain over and over like a broken record. When you swim fast, songs are out of the question. You'll be working too hard. He goes on to joke about the Carpenters and the Osmonds ... :eek: (all on p.7) I like it as a method of determining pace, especially for workouts when I don't want to be too obsessed with the clock.

-anything by Led Zeppelin......

I'm with Loreta. I don't know how you guys can be singing. I chant that's 200, 200, 200, next will be 250, left elbow up, oops is this 200 or 250??? No time for singing.

I swim without a cap or ear plugs. I find swimming to be an intensely aural experience (unless I get swamped and get a mouthful of water--then it becomes suddenly oral). I can barely count strokes. No way I could carry a tune!

My little ditty goes something like this... First stanza: "reach, reach, breathe..reach, reach, breathe..." second stanza: "get ready to flip; tuck, push, don't breathe" third stanza: "reach, breathe..reach, breathe..reach, breathe.." chorus: "kick, kick, rotate...kick, kick, rotate" A little different version for *** and back. Cheers!

My tune is a little less classical than most of the previous listings. For anything over 200 yds, I'm singing "Bat out of Hell" - MeatLoaf. (Don't laugh, I'm serious)

I tend to count while I swim - keeps me in a nice pace. Loreta