Push ups?

:hijack: Kirk, in your opinion, what would be the minimum daily (quality) yardage necessary to improve my 1650 race time, if I am training 6 days/wk? ... High intensity training is still out of the question, because I had a setback in August when I popped the scar tissue in my hip and had to start over from square one. Instead, my "sprints" are not at 100% effort, and I'm training hardest for the events my hip handles the best at this point: distance free and 200 fly. Since we're talking about the 1650 it's not really sprinting, so you could still get a lot of benefit from doing USRPT if you want to go that route. With that training you could probably keep the yardage you're doing now. You certainly would not need to do more than 3,000 yards per workout. And if you do USRPT you can't worry about total yardage. Just be concerned you are doing those sets correctly. If you want to do more traditional, longer aerobic training I would suggest that on the majority of your training days you get in at least one set where you are swimming for a minimum of 20 minutes and preferably 30 minutes without a lot of rest. Not straight swimming for 40 minutes, but a set where you're not getting much rest between swims. You'll still want to do some sets where you're maintaining your goal 1650 pace, but you don't need to do those day in and day out like USRPT advocates. If you can swim six days per week and average 3,000 yards per workout you'll be over 500 miles for the year.

:hijack: Kirk, in your opinion, what would be the minimum daily (quality) yardage necessary to improve my 1650 race time, if I am training 6 days/wk? ... High intensity training is still out of the question, because I had a setback in August when I popped the scar tissue in my hip and had to start over from square one. Instead, my "sprints" are not at 100% effort, and I'm training hardest for the events my hip handles the best at this point: distance free and 200 fly. Since we're talking about the 1650 it's not really sprinting, so you could still get a lot of benefit from doing USRPT if you want to go that route. With that training you could probably keep the yardage you're doing now. You certainly would not need to do more than 3,000 yards per workout. And if you do USRPT you can't worry about total yardage. Just be concerned you are doing those sets correctly. If you want to do more traditional, longer aerobic training I would suggest that on the majority of your training days you get in at least one set where you are swimming for a minimum of 20 minutes and preferably 30 minutes without a lot of rest. Not straight swimming for 40 minutes, but a set where you're not getting much rest between swims. You'll still want to do some sets where you're maintaining your goal 1650 pace, but you don't need to do those day in and day out like USRPT advocates. If you can swim six days per week and average 3,000 yards per workout you'll be over 500 miles for the year.