I have a meet coming up the first weekend in May. I want to break 6:00 in the 500; first time since college.
In Oct I went 6:01+. I feel good now, but if you have suggestions on how to finish/taper the work outs until
then I'd really appreciate it.
I'm a 49 year old male, can swim 4x a week for about an hour.
Thanks,
Fisch
Parents
Former Member
Ion,
I expect that if you can keep up with the 50 and 1:50 freestylers in practice, but not in meets, either:
You're really a distance swimmer and maybe can't go fast in the short races.
or
You need more speed practice.
I suspect the latter. Go to as many meets as you can.
Also, if you are keeping at it, you will get faster, sometimes in big chunks at a time. Consistency, consistency, consistency. Make sure you are logging your practice times and intervals so you can see the improvement as you go. You might feel no faster, but a year ago you couldn't do the sets you do now, I'll bet.
In terms of training speed, when I went 50 and 1:50 in freestyle, I did about 10:30 for a 1000, and could hold 58-59 for 5-10 100s on 1:30. With paddles a few seconds faster, pull-bouy was an effort to hold under 1:00. We did not do intervals faster than 1:30. I was not very strong, but in good aerobic shape.
The best I've been able to tell, in the 1930s, before circle swimming, practice consisted of a lot of 25s, or taking turns swimming longer distances. Very high quality.
Swim fast all,
Greg
Ion,
I expect that if you can keep up with the 50 and 1:50 freestylers in practice, but not in meets, either:
You're really a distance swimmer and maybe can't go fast in the short races.
or
You need more speed practice.
I suspect the latter. Go to as many meets as you can.
Also, if you are keeping at it, you will get faster, sometimes in big chunks at a time. Consistency, consistency, consistency. Make sure you are logging your practice times and intervals so you can see the improvement as you go. You might feel no faster, but a year ago you couldn't do the sets you do now, I'll bet.
In terms of training speed, when I went 50 and 1:50 in freestyle, I did about 10:30 for a 1000, and could hold 58-59 for 5-10 100s on 1:30. With paddles a few seconds faster, pull-bouy was an effort to hold under 1:00. We did not do intervals faster than 1:30. I was not very strong, but in good aerobic shape.
The best I've been able to tell, in the 1930s, before circle swimming, practice consisted of a lot of 25s, or taking turns swimming longer distances. Very high quality.
Swim fast all,
Greg
