Hi all -- I just joined this forum, and have enjoyed reading through many of the archived messages.
Here's my situation: I was a decent distance swimmer in high school (e.g., 4:53 500 free) and am just now returning to swimming at age 34 after essentially 15 years out of the pool.
After being back for about a month, my stroke feels OK and I crank out a reasonably fast 100, and I'm starting to think I'd like to get back into good distance swimming shape. SC Nationals are here in Phoenix next May, and I'd like to target the longer free events.
However, I can't envision working out the way I did 15 years ago (i.e., double workouts, ~8000 yards/day). Finding the time for anything more than the typical ~3500M masters workout 4-5X/week would be challenging.
Can anyone out there give me any insight into what sort of training national-level masters distance swimmers are doing? I'm interested in getting caught up on current distance training theories -- e.g., can interval training alone, without lots of yardage, be enough? I'd be very interested in any articles or other resources anyone could suggest on this topic.
Also, a different issue I'll toss out there: I quit competitive swimming at age 18, somewhat before my potential prime, I think. At age 34, is it delusional to think I might eventually be able to go as fast or faster than I went then? Or are those days long past?
I suspect people raise these kinds of issues periodically, and if I missed discussion of these points in the archives, my apologies. Any thoughts anyone can offer will be most welcomed.
--Brad
Brad--
Thanks for sending that link--very interesting story. As Lance Armstrong has shown in cycling, getting yourself into peak aerobic shape by lunatic effort can pay off handsomely...
Alas, most of us don't have the time or the familial support or the postal department contract to spend 4 hours a day or more courting cardiac disaster. Still, I reallly think the philosophy of those famous distance swimmers quoted in your link--i.e., hard work is the only route to ultimate success--can be embraced, at least a little, by many of us masters swimmers today.
In my case, I think I will amend the philosophy slightly to read as follows: Hard work (lite) is the only route to ultimate success (lite), and this is pretty much all I personally am hoping for.
Two other quick comments:
1) I will personally reserve judgement on the overtraining issue until more studies prove the case conclusively one way or the other. On Saturday Night Live, there was a skit featuring Dana Carvey as an old man relating how hard things were back in his day. He'd always end the monolog with "and we LIKED it that way." You see the same thing in older doctors who did their residency programs staying awake 72 hours at a stretch. "And we LIKED it that way," they tell younger residents today who appear to be complaining lily-livered weaklings because they want to sleep once every 56 hours. (I'm not convinced the od guys' patients liked such doctoring all that much.)
Anyhow, there may be some of this macho attitude going on here with retired great distance swimmers. "My favorite set was 100 100's on a minute, with a half dozen rolls of quarters in my suit, and we LIKED it that way."
On the other hand, there is certainly something to be said for working extremely hard.
2) Don't go the sprinter route! If you could once do a 4:53 for the 500 freestyle, you almost certainly are gifted with an inordinately large contingent of slow twitch muscles. You've already got, in other words, a huge biological advantage over many of your fellow 30-somethings. Also, I think endurance capacity persists longer than raw sprinting strength. Maybe give yourself a year to do 50s and 100s, then work your way up to 200s and 500s, then before you know it, you'll be back in the distance swimmer mindset. And you'll be able to tell all your 20-something friends, "And we LIKE it like that."
Again, good luck.
Brad--
Thanks for sending that link--very interesting story. As Lance Armstrong has shown in cycling, getting yourself into peak aerobic shape by lunatic effort can pay off handsomely...
Alas, most of us don't have the time or the familial support or the postal department contract to spend 4 hours a day or more courting cardiac disaster. Still, I reallly think the philosophy of those famous distance swimmers quoted in your link--i.e., hard work is the only route to ultimate success--can be embraced, at least a little, by many of us masters swimmers today.
In my case, I think I will amend the philosophy slightly to read as follows: Hard work (lite) is the only route to ultimate success (lite), and this is pretty much all I personally am hoping for.
Two other quick comments:
1) I will personally reserve judgement on the overtraining issue until more studies prove the case conclusively one way or the other. On Saturday Night Live, there was a skit featuring Dana Carvey as an old man relating how hard things were back in his day. He'd always end the monolog with "and we LIKED it that way." You see the same thing in older doctors who did their residency programs staying awake 72 hours at a stretch. "And we LIKED it that way," they tell younger residents today who appear to be complaining lily-livered weaklings because they want to sleep once every 56 hours. (I'm not convinced the od guys' patients liked such doctoring all that much.)
Anyhow, there may be some of this macho attitude going on here with retired great distance swimmers. "My favorite set was 100 100's on a minute, with a half dozen rolls of quarters in my suit, and we LIKED it that way."
On the other hand, there is certainly something to be said for working extremely hard.
2) Don't go the sprinter route! If you could once do a 4:53 for the 500 freestyle, you almost certainly are gifted with an inordinately large contingent of slow twitch muscles. You've already got, in other words, a huge biological advantage over many of your fellow 30-somethings. Also, I think endurance capacity persists longer than raw sprinting strength. Maybe give yourself a year to do 50s and 100s, then work your way up to 200s and 500s, then before you know it, you'll be back in the distance swimmer mindset. And you'll be able to tell all your 20-something friends, "And we LIKE it like that."
Again, good luck.
