I've just met a top swimmer in my country who is now in his 40s, and he is in the top 5 of the national long distance swimming championships, not in the age group, but overall.
He mentioned that he trains about 80 km a week. I wonder how he can keep such amount of training in his working age, and I have found out that he is the CEO of a telecommunication company he created, i.e. he's an entrepreneur. He trains at a recreation club, i.e. a place exclusively for the upper social class.
However, even for me working in a standard 9 - 18 office job Monday to Friday, I cannot do more than 20 km a week, and recently due to the pool opening time (the pool I use opens 7:30 and closes 19:00 in winter), I can only do about 13 km a week, which is totally not enough for my target race (my target is to do 15 km race next year). If I need to do the channel afterwards I must convert my full time job to part time in the winter preceding my attempt in order to have enough training, i.e. live off my saving.
The life of an entrepreneur, with no doubt, is much busier than employed as a 9-18 office worker, how is he still possible to have 80 km training a week? This question is very offending that I dare not ask him directly.
I think part of it is just how bad you want to train, how much you like it, what you are trying to accomplish, etc. Where there is a will, there is a way. When I first moved to Little Rock after college, I had a full time job (not a 9-5, but a 7-3 M-F) but I loved swimming so much and was actually getting faster than I had been in college so I kept pushing it. I wasn't getting 80k in a week (that IS kind of crazy), but I found a way to balance the job and making 9 practices a week and doing about 40-50k a week (at peak).
I knew what I needed to do to get where I wanted to be, so I found a way to make it work.
I realize my situation was a little different given I am half the OP's example's age.
I think part of it is just how bad you want to train, how much you like it, what you are trying to accomplish, etc. Where there is a will, there is a way. When I first moved to Little Rock after college, I had a full time job (not a 9-5, but a 7-3 M-F) but I loved swimming so much and was actually getting faster than I had been in college so I kept pushing it. I wasn't getting 80k in a week (that IS kind of crazy), but I found a way to balance the job and making 9 practices a week and doing about 40-50k a week (at peak).
I knew what I needed to do to get where I wanted to be, so I found a way to make it work.
I realize my situation was a little different given I am half the OP's example's age.
