Started swimming again this year in an effort to get in better shape. Haven't done it since college (I'm 43), and that was just for exercise. Did it as a kid, now my kids also swim. At any rate, I'm just doing laps right now. Usually 6 sets of 500, occasionally only 5 and occasionally 7 or 8. ~5 days a week when life doesn't get in the way (so about 15,000 yards per week). About 25% ***, 25% back, and 50% free. I have occasionally thrown some fly in there, but I just can't do it without it fatiguing me to the point where the remainder of the set is very suboptimal.
At any rate, I am wondering at what point I should start looking to transition to doing workouts, rather than just laps. There is no Masters program that will work for me, so I'd just be following the posted workouts from the forums. Should I just jump right in? Should I start from "week 1," or just hit it right in the middle? Also, should I just be looking mostly at the general workouts, of mixing it up with the IM workouts to get more strokes, or start with general and slowly work my way towards the IM stuff?
Anything y'all need to know to help guide me the right way?
Alright, so a few weeks in and things are going pretty well. That whole drowning while doing backstroke thing was solved with the nose clip. So much so that I can actually hold underwaters for 12-13 yards even after a 3500 yard workout. :woot:
So admittedly, the first few workouts I tried I wasn't able to finish. Mark beat me up pretty badly. At any rate, that's pretty much better, now. I still have a lot of work to do. I am quite sure I'm doing some of the drills wrong. I don't know how to figure out how to pace myself, and while I am getting a lot better at doing flip turns consistently, they take too much out of me, and I can't do them for a whole workout. I think it is related to the fact that I have to breathe out while doing them. Good news is, when I started swimming laps in February, my heart rate was in the low 70's. Got down to mid 60's pretty quickly, but stayed there. I had hoped to lose about 15 pounds, most of which I did with diet changes, but I'm actually down about 25. Lost 3" in my waist. None of that has changed with the change to workouts......but my heart rate is actually down a bit. That was the one goal I hadn't been able to hit until I started doing this, I'm now in the upper 50's.
So two general questions for anyone who might have followed the path that I did. First is the whole flip turn thing. Are you best served just forcing your way through it, or are you better off reverting to touch turns to get through a set. Right now, when the sets are focused on shorter events, I'll do flip turns. When longer, I'll do touch turns.
Second set is how to figure out how to pace oneself? Example, I somewhat arbitrarily picked a 40 second pace to use as a baseline for my 200 free workout. And I really had a hard time hitting it. I tried slowing down my tempo, but still focused on my efficiency (long reach, slow but hard pull). I kept coming in around 36-37 seconds. Easily 3/4 of the time. I may have hit :40 once every 8 reps. Which is all well and fine.....early on. Towards the end I could feel my stroke getting sloppier. I'd still make the interval, but I just felt the stroke going away from me. Then when I went to do a test set (150 yards at pace), I crashed. I had done 16 50's at :40 or under with :20 rest (:15 on last four). And after 100 yards at 1:22, I couldn't make it any further. Was dead.
Contrast that with the 500 workout. I know I can do a 500 in under 7:30, I have hit 7:15 a few times early on while lap swimming. But I still for the sake of getting through the workout (and frankly keeping track of the clock!), I went for a 7:30, or :45 pace. Kept coming in at :42, occasionally :43. That workout was fine, I'm actually writing up the intervals on the clock based on a :43 pace for the next time Mark posts that workout. I think I'll be safe with that, I did the Davis Mile today in 28:01 (or a 26:21 1650).
But here is what gets me. I did 40 50's at that pace, on 4 hours of sleep, and was fine. Yet the day before working on the 200's, after having only done 16 50's, I couldn't even hold :40 for 100 yards. The one difference that may have worked in favor of the 500's is that I did all touch turns on it, and all flip turns on the workout for the 200's.
Any thoughts? Am I off to think that I ought to be able to hit teh 200 more easily than I did the 500?
Alright, so a few weeks in and things are going pretty well. That whole drowning while doing backstroke thing was solved with the nose clip. So much so that I can actually hold underwaters for 12-13 yards even after a 3500 yard workout. :woot:
So admittedly, the first few workouts I tried I wasn't able to finish. Mark beat me up pretty badly. At any rate, that's pretty much better, now. I still have a lot of work to do. I am quite sure I'm doing some of the drills wrong. I don't know how to figure out how to pace myself, and while I am getting a lot better at doing flip turns consistently, they take too much out of me, and I can't do them for a whole workout. I think it is related to the fact that I have to breathe out while doing them. Good news is, when I started swimming laps in February, my heart rate was in the low 70's. Got down to mid 60's pretty quickly, but stayed there. I had hoped to lose about 15 pounds, most of which I did with diet changes, but I'm actually down about 25. Lost 3" in my waist. None of that has changed with the change to workouts......but my heart rate is actually down a bit. That was the one goal I hadn't been able to hit until I started doing this, I'm now in the upper 50's.
So two general questions for anyone who might have followed the path that I did. First is the whole flip turn thing. Are you best served just forcing your way through it, or are you better off reverting to touch turns to get through a set. Right now, when the sets are focused on shorter events, I'll do flip turns. When longer, I'll do touch turns.
Second set is how to figure out how to pace oneself? Example, I somewhat arbitrarily picked a 40 second pace to use as a baseline for my 200 free workout. And I really had a hard time hitting it. I tried slowing down my tempo, but still focused on my efficiency (long reach, slow but hard pull). I kept coming in around 36-37 seconds. Easily 3/4 of the time. I may have hit :40 once every 8 reps. Which is all well and fine.....early on. Towards the end I could feel my stroke getting sloppier. I'd still make the interval, but I just felt the stroke going away from me. Then when I went to do a test set (150 yards at pace), I crashed. I had done 16 50's at :40 or under with :20 rest (:15 on last four). And after 100 yards at 1:22, I couldn't make it any further. Was dead.
Contrast that with the 500 workout. I know I can do a 500 in under 7:30, I have hit 7:15 a few times early on while lap swimming. But I still for the sake of getting through the workout (and frankly keeping track of the clock!), I went for a 7:30, or :45 pace. Kept coming in at :42, occasionally :43. That workout was fine, I'm actually writing up the intervals on the clock based on a :43 pace for the next time Mark posts that workout. I think I'll be safe with that, I did the Davis Mile today in 28:01 (or a 26:21 1650).
But here is what gets me. I did 40 50's at that pace, on 4 hours of sleep, and was fine. Yet the day before working on the 200's, after having only done 16 50's, I couldn't even hold :40 for 100 yards. The one difference that may have worked in favor of the 500's is that I did all touch turns on it, and all flip turns on the workout for the 200's.
Any thoughts? Am I off to think that I ought to be able to hit teh 200 more easily than I did the 500?
