I took my 1500 m time in a 50 m pool 12 weeks before, and it was 31'42". Afterwards the 50 m pool I use closed for annual maintenance.
In these 12 weeks, I joined a squad and did 2 sessions per week, swam open water with a group every weekend, and also swam intervals on my own in a 25 m pool, with about 12 - 15 km total per week.
The 50 m pool I use reopened this week, so the first thing I did while returning was to take my time again, but the result was 31'13" - only 29 seconds improvement over 12 weeks! In contrast, I improved for 45 seconds in the preceding 6 weeks, from 32'27" to 31'42", and those 6 weeks were the weeks I newly joined the squad and I normally did only 1 session per week, and no intervals on my own.
I was targeting 30' and attempted to swim at an aerobic intensity which I thought I could sustain for 30 lengths, but I could only sustain my form for around 400 m. Afterwards, I felt my teres major were so tight that I couldn't perform my stroke well, my arms simply failed to execute my desired stroke even I reduced my stroke rate a bit, and the stiffness even persisted in the cool down after completing the set, and for another few hours.
According to my wearable, I was taking 31 - 32 cycles at the beginning, and 34 - 35 cycles at the end per 50 m length, while my stroke rate remained mostly the same. I was swimming at around 59" / 50 m in the 2nd to 4th lengths, then deteriorated to around 62" / 50 m in the middle, and about 65" / 50 m by the end.
The cumulative time as recorded by my wearable was follows:
250 m: 4'52"
500 m: 9'59"
750 m: 15'19"
1000 m: 20'31"
1250 m: 25'56"
1500 m: 31'14"
I'm very disappointed that, even after a few months of intense training, I still haven't reached 30' / 1500 m in long course yet. I'm taking a very expensive 1-1 professional analysis tomorrow, and hope that afterwards I can know all my technique problems and target them in the coming month in my own training, and get a jump in my speed.
I am feeling like a total beginner now - having to catch my breath every 50 m in the pool while I was doing thousands in the past, and in the open water swimming I was struggling even before 2 km, needing to stop and rest, while I was targeting 7 km before.
Something is not right - based on your description. Making technique adjustments might seem awkward, but you should not be out of breath unless you are doing something wrong or at too high an intensity. Technical changes need to be made at slow speeds to understand how the muscles, limbs, and body need to move together. They should NOT be done at a high intensity level until you have mastered the skill at a slow pace. Only after you get it all together should you try to increase the intensity.
Good technical swimming should feel like a "sweet spot" - it will be far different than what you were doing, but it should not feel harder than what you were doing before. This is why I said you need constant feedback during this time of change.
Forget about the clock and time - focus entirely on what your coach told you to do and get constant feedback. Your heart rate should not be anywhere close to 100 bpm at this point. If it is higher than that, you are doing something wrong.
Another stab in the dark - describe your body position in the water (extreme detail: head, shoulders, hips, feet, and their position in relation to each other).
Windrath
Windrath
Once I remove the toys while trying to incorporate the changes, I feel completely out of balance if I do it slowly. I relied on the TI way of pressing down the head and chest to keep balance in the past, but as shown in the analysis it actually created a large dead spot, disturbing that balance.
In the analysis, the coach told me that:
- my head was too low
- my arm was overreaching, such that the upper arm entered first, and the hand last
- my arm was pressing down the water instead of doing a proper catch, that lifted up my head for breathing but made my hip and legs sank
- I was overrotating to nearly 90°, creating cross-over and scissor legs
The coach told me to do a drill, which break the stroke such that I hold the catch position, and use a snorkel to see if my hand entry is clean.
The analysis was done on Friday evening, and on Saturday morning I immediately went back to the pool and do the drills taught, and got that kind of awkward feeling, and on Sunday morning open water group social swim with my club I needed to stop and rest every few hundred metres. I returned to the pool afterwards and continue to do the drill, and I was feeling my shoulders tired, lats totally fatigued, and even some neck pain afterwards, probably due to those unnatural movement I needed to pick up. (My shoulder dropped a lot in the past, and now I have to keep it up)
Breaking the stroke down to absolute basics will probably take an adjustment period, but if you stay focused and refrain from old habits, there should be no reason not to excel well beyond your prior bests within a few months. Remember, it took thousands of km’s of inaccurate application of stroke technique, swimming inefficient will continue to feel natural and easier.
In the analysis, the coach told me that:
- my head was too low
- my arm was overreaching, such that the upper arm entered first, and the hand last
- my arm was pressing down the water instead of doing a proper catch, that lifted up my head for breathing but made my hip and legs sank
- I was overrotating to nearly 90°, creating cross-over and scissor legs
From the report it sounds you were expending most of your propulsive energy on fighting balance.
Breaking the stroke down to absolute basics will probably take an adjustment period, but if you stay focused and refrain from old habits, there should be no reason not to excel well beyond your prior bests within a few months. Remember, it took thousands of km’s of inaccurate application of stroke technique, swimming inefficient will continue to feel natural and easier.
From the report it sounds you were expending most of your propulsive energy on fighting balance.
It has been a week after the analysis lesson and most of the time in this week I was doing drills, but I couldn't resist the temptation of inserting a timed fast 200 m by the end of my workout, which was very near to my best time in the past.
Also, I noticed that, when I used a pull buoy combined with ankle band, I was feeling myself seriously out of balance, but my coach noticed me I was actually faster with the band in the squad session on Tuesday. I was feeling my legs very low when I was swimming with pull buoy and band, but after I stopped, I felt my legs floated back up to the surface, indicating I might still be pressing down at the front. I returned to the pool today and tried to eliminate the act of pressing downward at the front in order to keep my legs up, i.e. to make my forearm vertical as soon as possible, but it was so tiring to my shoulders and upper body that I could no longer perform the correct action after 100 m.
Afterwards, I swam a few 50 m on interval without toys, and another guy in the pool told me that my kick was too wide, even I was consciously preventing scissor legs by touching my toes in my kick.
4 years ago I initially learned to swim by pressing my head and chest very low in the water whenever I felt my balance was off. I bought a snorkel last year by the time I started squad training, and the initially water filled my snorkel from the top which forced me to change my head position, but as the analysis showed, it was still too low. As I could no longer use my head and chest for my balance, I resorted to kicking much wider than usual, otherwise I was feeling my legs seriously dropping.
I returned to pool to time my 1500 m and I am totally frustrated now as I'm MUCH worse than before!!!!! despite my apparent improvement in shorter distances. The time I've just got is 32'36", more than a minute slower than before I got the analysis on 2019-02-22.
I remember that last month I was feeling great and keeping my target pace (1 minute per length) until around 500 m in my 1500 m T/T, but today I fell out of that target at around 250 m, and I was feeling arms fatigued so early that I couldn't do the proper technique which I should be doing. It then became a vicious cycle. I was struggling in the latter half, fatigued to the extent that the technique was completely lost, arms flailing slowly but without grasping for air, and the pace became a horrible 2'15" - 2'20" / 100 m by then. Under normal circumstances if I feel my stroke is breaking down I stop my workout immediately.
To compare, last October I was swimming at 60" for 50 m interval on 75", but now I am swimming at 55" for 50 m interval on 75" for about 30 x 50 m, but this improvement has not translated into my 1500 m time yet.
I am suspecting if I've paced my T/T wrong because this 1500 m time is unreasonable given the improvement in my 400 m. I am suspecting not too fast at the start, but too slow instead. I have a huge dilemma here - as it seems that my technique is actually better when I try to swim faster, with less muscular fatigue, but there is an aerobic limit as well. From my observation, the following may happen:
If I start off too fast I will be gassed which forces me to slow down to recover my aerobic deficit, and by slowing down my swimming becomes inefficient which causes fatigue, and never returns to my full potential again.
If I start off too slow, my swimming is less efficient when swimming fast, causing the same or even more fatigue when compared to swimming fast, and my speed drops further. Therefore negative splitting a race isn't really an option for me. (e.g. if I started 1'45" in the initial 100 for my 200, I may do 1'55" in the remaining 100; if I started 1'55" in the initial 100, there is no way for me to do anything less than 1'55" in the remaining 100)
I'm trying different pacing tomorrow to see how it goes.
The following is my past times taken, you can see how I didn't improve over the past year.
date
pool length
air temperature
Water temperature
200
400
1500
2018-05-08
50
00:35:09
2018-05-17
50
00:36:41
2018-05-29
50
00:04:06
2018-05-31
50
00:34:02
2018-06-05
50
00:04:14
00:08:52
2018-06-08
50
00:04:04
00:08:34
2018-06-14
50
00:03:57
2018-07-20
50
00:03:54
00:33:42
2018-07-22
50
00:32:41
2018-08-28
50
00:33:21
2018-09-12
50
00:04:12
00:08:39
2018-09-19
50
00:04:11
00:08:37
2018-09-20
50
00:03:54
00:08:01
2018-09-21
50
00:03:48
2018-09-24
50
00:03:45
2018-09-26
50
00:03:41
2018-09-28
50
00:03:42
2018-10-03
50
00:03:39
2018-10-04
50
00:07:49
2018-10-19
50
00:32:27
2018-10-26
50
00:03:42
2018-10-31
50
00:32:06
2018-11-07
50
00:08:14
2018-11-08
50
00:08:08
2018-11-23
50
00:04:10
00:08:30
2018-11-24
50
00:04:00
00:08:01
2018-11-30
50
21
22
00:31:42
2018-12-14
50
16
17
00:34:20
2019-02-21
50
22
24
00:31:13
2019-02-26
50
18
21
00:03:47
2019-02-28
50
21
22
00:03:40
2019-03-02
50
23
23
00:07:45
2019-03-07
50
20
23
00:03:48
00:07:41
2019-03-14
50
21
21
00:03:42
2019-03-21
50
22
24
00:32:36
As discussed in the other forum in which you've raised all these concerns: stop analyzing (so much) and just get in the water. This is supposed to be fun. Sign up for the 5k and swim as much of it as you can.
