I'm 35 years old 175cm 64kg male self taught swimmer starting from zero 5 years ago. I swam laps for a while, but soon developed interest and passion in swimming fast over short distances and relentless daily practice.
I have times in all strokes, but use freestyle as main benchmark. First time I tried to swim short course 100m freestyle I timed around 1:40. Over time this improved to 1:35, 1:27, 1:17 and reached a plateau there.
So I went through a year or so of the Starting Strength program, deadlifted 100kg in sets of 5 and squatted 80kg. I began to feel like my body line, explosiveness, starts and push offs improved. Freestyle time didn't improve dramatically, only down to 1:15.
At that point I felt I knew plenty about training of energy systems from Olbrecht, so I decided to only focus on improving my pure speed. I take 17 seconds for a push 25 in 18 strokes at 90-100 spm.
I followed Boomer's Freestyle Reimagined and took my stroke apart 4 weeks ago. A stroke change is clearly going to take 4 months or years to happen, not 4 weeks, but I am beginning to lose the enjoyment. I am hugely motivated to see myself break the 15sec 25m and ultimately the freestyle minute, and have no idea whether it is possible with no youth swimming background.
I posted on the UK Swimming Forum, but had no reply and thought I would post here too in search for tips or similar experiences. Would appreciate any comments!
I've seen an adult successfully join an age group program, and haven't tried that myself. I swam with a masters club for 2 years, which was a lot of fun, but these seem to be geared towards fitness and training rather than focused development of speed. Moreover, I am not quite so fast and fit to join some of the higher profile clubs. I've been to see a number of coaches/swimmers for advice, including Swim Smooth, who all had valuable input, but nothing seemed to really point me towards some a big area of improvement. I feel like I might be missing an obvious one. There are definitely areas like "feel for water" and "stroke efficicency" that remain mystical to me despite having read volumes.
Thank you. What sort of rate for a 100 free would you say can work better for my build? I actually go out at 120 spm in my PB video and drop to 105 or so towards the end. Obviously would like to pace better. 16 seconds is push to feet, that means including a turn. The turn takes between 1.0 to 1.5 from last stroke to feet planted.
Your video looks to be about 80-90. Hard to say, I can only see about 6 strokes. I dont know what a good rate is, to be honest. I imagine it depends on the individual. Maybe try some USRPT sets. Goal time is 15 seconds, play with stroke count to find what works best. For me, a sprint will be around 19 on a 25 yard pool, for a 13 second lap (I figure 4-5 seconds of that are UDK). So I'm guessing that will put me close to your 120 SPM? I cant quite hold that for a 100, just throwing a benchmark at you. And again, my figures are yards.
Thank you. What sort of rate for a 100 free would you say can work better for my build? I actually go out at 120 spm in my PB video and drop to 105 or so towards the end. Obviously would like to pace better. 16 seconds is push to feet, that means including a turn. The turn takes between 1.0 to 1.5 from last stroke to feet planted.
Your video looks to be about 80-90. Hard to say, I can only see about 6 strokes. I dont know what a good rate is, to be honest. I imagine it depends on the individual. Maybe try some USRPT sets. Goal time is 15 seconds, play with stroke count to find what works best. For me, a sprint will be around 19 on a 25 yard pool, for a 13 second lap (I figure 4-5 seconds of that are UDK). So I'm guessing that will put me close to your 120 SPM? I cant quite hold that for a 100, just throwing a benchmark at you. And again, my figures are yards.
