I swam as a junior until I was 15, then took a long break until I started doing triathlons at age 50, and am now coming up on my 62nd birthday.
Really enjoy my swimming so decided to come out of my competitive swimming "retirement" and enter a Masters meet in June. Going to limit myself to 50M and 100M for now, but down the road would like to start swimming IM again.
No expectations; I figure I'll be left in the wake during the first heats, but just want to have some fun and see how I can do.
Any words of wisdom?
Mark
I just started my swimming comeback last fall after a 27 year layoff. I was quite a bit younger than you are now (45), but I was also coming off 24 years of virtually no fitness training at all. With a decade+ of triathlon training, you probably have a much better cardio-base than I did.
After 6 months, I'm reasonably competitive in my age group in freestyle events from 50-500 yards. Actually swam two qualifying times for Summer Nationals at my last meet, in the 200 and 500 yard free. My advice, if you're looking to improve your race times, would be to do more short, high intensity workouts than fewer, longer, less intense workouts. 2500 yards, 6 times a week canbe better than 5000 yards, 3 times a week. USRPT (Ultra Short Race Pace Training) is the specific method I've been using.
In the meantime, I think a technique clinic would be a great idea. If Swimspire were coming to someplace near me, I would figure out how to be there. Effort without good technique can almost be counter-productive in swimming.
I just started my swimming comeback last fall after a 27 year layoff. I was quite a bit younger than you are now (45), but I was also coming off 24 years of virtually no fitness training at all. With a decade+ of triathlon training, you probably have a much better cardio-base than I did.
After 6 months, I'm reasonably competitive in my age group in freestyle events from 50-500 yards. Actually swam two qualifying times for Summer Nationals at my last meet, in the 200 and 500 yard free. My advice, if you're looking to improve your race times, would be to do more short, high intensity workouts than fewer, longer, less intense workouts. 2500 yards, 6 times a week canbe better than 5000 yards, 3 times a week. USRPT (Ultra Short Race Pace Training) is the specific method I've been using.
In the meantime, I think a technique clinic would be a great idea. If Swimspire were coming to someplace near me, I would figure out how to be there. Effort without good technique can almost be counter-productive in swimming.
