Fast times in Hawaii: what are yours and how you plan on training?

OK, I'll start this one... What the?!?!?

Thursday evening I was doing a yards pool workout at UCSD, with the main set being a good preparation for the Hawaii meet in May ('base' refers to the cruising pace per 100, when swimming a straight 1,000): 1 x 400 in (base + 5 seconds) per 100; 6 x 100 in base; 1 x 50 easy; 1x 300 in (base + 5 seconds) per 100; 4 x 125 in (base - 5 seconds) per 100; 1 x 50 easy; 2 x 200 in (base + 5 seconds) per 100; 2 x 150 in (base - 10 seconds) per 100; 1 x 50 easy; 1 x 100 in base + 5 seconds; 1 x 200 fast; 1 x 50 easy; It is a competitive workout.

So far I am the only one in this thread who is publicly trying here to find psych-up ways for the meet in Hawaii. I didn't swim a fast workout yesterday, and I want to boost my preparation. Yesterday's workout in a 25 yards pool had this main set ("total base" here refers to the "base" time multiplied by the total distance): 3 x 200 in "total base" minus 5 (for me is leaving every 2:25); 4 x 50 easy; 2 x 300 in "total base" minus 10 (for me is leaving every 3:35); 4 x 50 kick; 4 x 100 in "base" minus 5, that I re-negotiated at "base" (1:15); 4 x 50, two fast, two easy; 2 x 300 in "total base" minus 5, that I re-negotiated at "base" (for me leaving every 3:45); 4 x 50 easy. In November and December I would have fought better than yesterday, so I analyzed the differences between then and January, February, past April in an internal minor competition, resting for the 1-hour swim this January, etc.. I think these three ingredients make up for a good meet preparation: 1) physically train the body at a level to be expected in competition; for this ensure the body is rested everyday; also I need to make sure I am not doing anylonger tapering for a competition, by swimming another stroke (backstroke) than the one I will be racing in (freestyle), because I am losing the feel for the stroke; for active rests I should keep doing freestyle, just slower; 2) mentally envision the feel for a fluid swim, like in a personally groundbreaking adventure; mentally be prepared to auction more and more efforts from the body, including hurting; make sure external concerns like work don't cloud this; 3) be able to raise the heart rate; don't back off from high rates by being scared in the middle of a swim. Who knows what's going to be, and in fact that's the thrill of this adventure of competing...

This link, from usswim.org, analyzes with an outstanding technical competence the 50 meter freestyle men race in the 2000SydneyOlympics finals: www.usswim.org/.../template.pl It appears, coming 5 meters into the wall Alex. Popov (Rus.) had the lead over everyone. I didn't know this. Upon different techniques of finishing, he finished in #6 with 22.24, behind the winning #21.98. Fascinating...

The link I gave, besides having commentary on tangibles with first-hand knowledge of racing (i.e.: commentary on different starting styles, on Hall (US) breathing once at 30 meter, on Ervin (US) not breathing, on different pulling styles, statistics for diving lengths, for velocity, 19.5 stroke cycles which is 39 strokes per 50 meter for Hall and Ervin, etc), has a video of the finish. I played the video. I think that at the top of the screen is lane 1 and at the bottom is lane 8; Hall is in lane 4, van den Hoogenband (Ned) is in lane 5, Popov (Rus) in lane 6, Ervin I believe is in lane 3; the video starts at about 3 meters before the T at the bottom of the pool, which should be at about 8 meters before the end. At the start of the video, 8 meters before the end, Popov's head is ahead of the field. It seems that in pure swimming, not in finishing, he was the fastest. He does a butterfly undulation close to the wall, and lifts his head while his arm floats softly short of a wall touch and extends to the wall. He did many excellent finishes in his career, including at least two in the year 2000, but this one he blew it. Next to him, in lane 5, van den Hoogendand has this abnormal (by common standards) vitality, that gives him a propulsion almost on top of the water in the last 8 meters; he punches the wall and is impossible to tell who won; the commentary says he ended in third because he was caught in mid-move when touching. Next to him, in lane 4, Hall looks flawless to me, but next to Hall, in lane 3, Ervin seems to out-touch everybody. They both finish with the same winning time. This adventure certainly beats ordinary life; I can see why Alex Popov now age 31 and Mark Foster (GBR) now 32, persist on playing it over and over in each die-hard competition.