I swim with a group and we are having the quality vs. quantity debate.
Currently the Macho element feels all the need to pound yardage by doing everything on extremely low rest 5 to 10 seconds. Longer sets turn into a continuous swim and it becomes discouraging.
Like 50's on 40 and 100's on 120.
I am olds school and actually like 20 to 30 seconds rest so you can descend sets and push it.
Any thoughts on this?
It really depends. I am more inclined towards your thinking, but the former has its place. Personally, as it means aerobic endurance, I wouldn't spend a lot of time swimming like that, even early in a training period as I only spend a few hours a week in the pool.
So the answer is that you have to do a variety of intensities and volumes, and each has its own appropriate rest interval, depending on your events and where you are in the calendar. But if you are not doing this I'd tend to agree with you.
It really depends. I am more inclined towards your thinking, but the former has its place. Personally, as it means aerobic endurance, I wouldn't spend a lot of time swimming like that, even early in a training period as I only spend a few hours a week in the pool.
So the answer is that you have to do a variety of intensities and volumes, and each has its own appropriate rest interval, depending on your events and where you are in the calendar. But if you are not doing this I'd tend to agree with you.
