I wondered if any of you can help me with some perspective on this. I was a respectable age-group swimmer (age 8-18 - peaked around 16). Swimming was my life. I went on to do triathlons in college and casual running and swimming after that. Now in my late 30's. Have always swum to keep in shape, but getting slower every year.
How do those of you in the 30's, 40's etc. who had a previous swimming career deal with the disappointment of getting slower, and slower? It is so frustrating. I get particularly frustrated with myself when people in practice who I should be much faster than (ie they didn't swim competitively and have ummmm...less than ideal strokes), are beating me. I still have that competitive mindset.
Since I don't think I would swim respectable 30-something times in a meet (and I have little kids right now that are keeping me pretty busy) I am waiting until 40's to compete. My butterfly is still OK so thinking if I can do a respectable 200 butterfly in my 40's that would be an accomplishment.
Anyway I just wondered how others put this into perspective. Thanks!
Parents
Former Member
Shari,
You have asked an excellent question. In my humble opinion, coming to terms with this issue is crucial to sustaining an interest in Masters swimming for the long term (i.e. 10 years or more).
In a nutshell: you have to realize you are in your late 30's, rather than your late teens, that you are swimming now for different reasons, and that you have to find meaningful goals that take that fact into account. Simplistically, you can't workout now like you used to, so expecting to challenge your old PR's is not realistic. That is merely one aspect of what I will discuss below, but it is (or should be) the most blindingly obvious.
Why did you swim at 16? I don't know about you, but my reason was to break as many PR's and to lower them as much as possible, in each season. In other words, get faster than I ever was before in the next, oh say... 4 months. Why do you want to swim now, in your 30's? Again, I don't know about you, but my reason is to enjoy competitive swimming, and use it as my primary means of fitness for the next 40+ years. If those two statements are true for you, you ought to be able to see right away some changes in how you should approach Masters swimming.
First, you can't and you shouldn't try to bring the same kind of intensity to your training program. Your career is no longer about breaking PR's in the next 4 months. As you have pointed out, the general trend is to get slower with age. Even if you can power up on your training and mental focus for 4 months, what are you going to do for an encore half a year later, and the next, and the next... (Repeat 77 times). Good Lord, even Popov is going to retire some day! Focus your goal setting on the longer term (say 2-4 years out). Put together seasonal goals that work towards where you want to be long term. (I am kind of puttering with my backstroke and breaststroke, which are usually timed with a calendar rather than a stop watch, with the idea of maybe having a 400 IM that is not a complete embarrassment to mankind, in a couple of years or so. This is one example.) You are not going to graduate next year, and you aren't going to swim as many meets as you did at 16, so give yourself some time to work towards something big.
Second, you can't and you shouldn't try to swim as many yards as fast as you used to. As you pointed out, you have family obligations (to say nothing of a job) that preclude you from putting in the hours. Also, the sad fact is that even if the mind is willing to go through 2x day workouts at high yardage, most bodies in their 30’s and 40’s can’t sustain it. Your old sets and your old intervals may not be the best way to train, and at worst could be an injury trap. One of the wisest Masters coaches I ever had was the guy who told me to slow-down and back-off if I was obviously struggling with an over ambitious set. If I am having a bad workout, I tell myself it is not about the next meet; it’s about the next 30 years. I then stop doing anything that hurts in a way suggestive of a risk of injury (and I no longer bother with hand paddles, ever). I reset my workout to work on other skills that I can accomplish on that day, and try to leave with a good feeling so I am eager for the next practice, rather than burnt-out.
Third (finally circling back to your original question), set goals that reflect what you enjoy doing today, not your agenda from when you where an age grouper. I don’t know what your old coach’s objectives were, but if (s)he was like 99.9% of age group coaches, the idea was for you to score as many points for your team as possible and win the meet. That was perfectly fine, then, but it does not have to be an unchanging reality. You’re a grown-up; you get to decide what you like and what you have time to do. You only have to challenge old PR’s selectively, when you want to. Some of the other posts have made some marvelous suggestions. Just finishing a 200 fly is an achievement (and usually sufficient to place at almost any Masters meet). I have been pursuing that one myself the last few years, and I have learned along the way a whole new way to swim fly for “long” distance (over 75 yards in my case). You can also train for a long open water swim. You can prepare for eccentric combinations of events. For example, one of the local meets here has a couple of nutty programs you can enter. One is the “Spring No-Brainer” where you swim 50’s of each stroke and a 100 IM; the winner is the one with the lowest combined time. The other is the “Iron Glutton” where you swim the 200 fly, back and ***, 400 IM, and the 1500 free (and go straight to the oxygen tent when you are done; who cares who won?) You can train for a meet in an exotic place you’ve always wanted to visit. Even if you are not smashing PR’s, just competing there is a rush. You can dabble in triathlons; you can try to recruit some of your family members for a family relay at a local meet.
Training for technique is also a great idea. It does not over stress your body and gives you something else to work on when you just can’t crank it up on a particular day. It stays with you a lot longer if you lose your conditioning to a lay off or just plain aging. And, it gives you a way to achieve a “good” swim without relying on the stopwatch as the sole measure.
After you have put together all that nutty stuff, you can selectively challenge some of your old PR’s. There are a number of ways to do it. Lots of people like to use those time adjusted for age conversion tools that Jim mentioned (which despite the hand waving subjectivity of the adjustment) seem to give good benchmarks for setting personal goals. You can also try to beat some swim other than your all-time PR. I was pretty jazzed when I beat a high school PR in the 500 free a couple of years ago. It might be 30 seconds behind my all-time PR, but faster at 40 than at 18 has a certain cache. Aim for the qualifying times for USMS Nationals if they are a good challenge for you. They do have a pretty solid, objective basis for comparing yourself to the universe of other swimmers your age. Also, you can simply start with a clean slate, and try to set your own Masters PR’s. I was pretty excited to beat a time from ’94 SCN’s this past spring. You can still claim to be getting faster as you get older. Finally, there are all the events you did not particularly swim well as a youngster. Hey, I may have never done the 50 fly in high school or college, but a PR is a PR.
If there is a common theme here it is that you need to decide what is important to you TODAY, and find a rational way of measuring achievement against that standard. For all the reasons you’ve cited, what you used to be able to do can be demoralizing if that is your sole criterion for measuring success. Take control of your dreams; you have that authority.
Matt
Shari,
You have asked an excellent question. In my humble opinion, coming to terms with this issue is crucial to sustaining an interest in Masters swimming for the long term (i.e. 10 years or more).
In a nutshell: you have to realize you are in your late 30's, rather than your late teens, that you are swimming now for different reasons, and that you have to find meaningful goals that take that fact into account. Simplistically, you can't workout now like you used to, so expecting to challenge your old PR's is not realistic. That is merely one aspect of what I will discuss below, but it is (or should be) the most blindingly obvious.
Why did you swim at 16? I don't know about you, but my reason was to break as many PR's and to lower them as much as possible, in each season. In other words, get faster than I ever was before in the next, oh say... 4 months. Why do you want to swim now, in your 30's? Again, I don't know about you, but my reason is to enjoy competitive swimming, and use it as my primary means of fitness for the next 40+ years. If those two statements are true for you, you ought to be able to see right away some changes in how you should approach Masters swimming.
First, you can't and you shouldn't try to bring the same kind of intensity to your training program. Your career is no longer about breaking PR's in the next 4 months. As you have pointed out, the general trend is to get slower with age. Even if you can power up on your training and mental focus for 4 months, what are you going to do for an encore half a year later, and the next, and the next... (Repeat 77 times). Good Lord, even Popov is going to retire some day! Focus your goal setting on the longer term (say 2-4 years out). Put together seasonal goals that work towards where you want to be long term. (I am kind of puttering with my backstroke and breaststroke, which are usually timed with a calendar rather than a stop watch, with the idea of maybe having a 400 IM that is not a complete embarrassment to mankind, in a couple of years or so. This is one example.) You are not going to graduate next year, and you aren't going to swim as many meets as you did at 16, so give yourself some time to work towards something big.
Second, you can't and you shouldn't try to swim as many yards as fast as you used to. As you pointed out, you have family obligations (to say nothing of a job) that preclude you from putting in the hours. Also, the sad fact is that even if the mind is willing to go through 2x day workouts at high yardage, most bodies in their 30’s and 40’s can’t sustain it. Your old sets and your old intervals may not be the best way to train, and at worst could be an injury trap. One of the wisest Masters coaches I ever had was the guy who told me to slow-down and back-off if I was obviously struggling with an over ambitious set. If I am having a bad workout, I tell myself it is not about the next meet; it’s about the next 30 years. I then stop doing anything that hurts in a way suggestive of a risk of injury (and I no longer bother with hand paddles, ever). I reset my workout to work on other skills that I can accomplish on that day, and try to leave with a good feeling so I am eager for the next practice, rather than burnt-out.
Third (finally circling back to your original question), set goals that reflect what you enjoy doing today, not your agenda from when you where an age grouper. I don’t know what your old coach’s objectives were, but if (s)he was like 99.9% of age group coaches, the idea was for you to score as many points for your team as possible and win the meet. That was perfectly fine, then, but it does not have to be an unchanging reality. You’re a grown-up; you get to decide what you like and what you have time to do. You only have to challenge old PR’s selectively, when you want to. Some of the other posts have made some marvelous suggestions. Just finishing a 200 fly is an achievement (and usually sufficient to place at almost any Masters meet). I have been pursuing that one myself the last few years, and I have learned along the way a whole new way to swim fly for “long” distance (over 75 yards in my case). You can also train for a long open water swim. You can prepare for eccentric combinations of events. For example, one of the local meets here has a couple of nutty programs you can enter. One is the “Spring No-Brainer” where you swim 50’s of each stroke and a 100 IM; the winner is the one with the lowest combined time. The other is the “Iron Glutton” where you swim the 200 fly, back and ***, 400 IM, and the 1500 free (and go straight to the oxygen tent when you are done; who cares who won?) You can train for a meet in an exotic place you’ve always wanted to visit. Even if you are not smashing PR’s, just competing there is a rush. You can dabble in triathlons; you can try to recruit some of your family members for a family relay at a local meet.
Training for technique is also a great idea. It does not over stress your body and gives you something else to work on when you just can’t crank it up on a particular day. It stays with you a lot longer if you lose your conditioning to a lay off or just plain aging. And, it gives you a way to achieve a “good” swim without relying on the stopwatch as the sole measure.
After you have put together all that nutty stuff, you can selectively challenge some of your old PR’s. There are a number of ways to do it. Lots of people like to use those time adjusted for age conversion tools that Jim mentioned (which despite the hand waving subjectivity of the adjustment) seem to give good benchmarks for setting personal goals. You can also try to beat some swim other than your all-time PR. I was pretty jazzed when I beat a high school PR in the 500 free a couple of years ago. It might be 30 seconds behind my all-time PR, but faster at 40 than at 18 has a certain cache. Aim for the qualifying times for USMS Nationals if they are a good challenge for you. They do have a pretty solid, objective basis for comparing yourself to the universe of other swimmers your age. Also, you can simply start with a clean slate, and try to set your own Masters PR’s. I was pretty excited to beat a time from ’94 SCN’s this past spring. You can still claim to be getting faster as you get older. Finally, there are all the events you did not particularly swim well as a youngster. Hey, I may have never done the 50 fly in high school or college, but a PR is a PR.
If there is a common theme here it is that you need to decide what is important to you TODAY, and find a rational way of measuring achievement against that standard. For all the reasons you’ve cited, what you used to be able to do can be demoralizing if that is your sole criterion for measuring success. Take control of your dreams; you have that authority.
Matt
