swim log book

I use the USMS planner which is available by sending a self-addressed stamped envelope (5x7) with 60 cents postage to Tracy Grilli, USMS National Office, P.O. Box 185, Londonderry, NH 03053-0185. The only problem is its a small book. Depending on how long your workout is, you may have to write small. All I really do is keep track of my total yardage.

If you have access to a computer, you might try keeping your weekly yards on a spread sheet. I've been doing this for the past six years, and it's proven a great way to keep motivated. I put down my yards each week, including the times I am out of town or sick or otherwise unable to swim, and the little program I wrote automatically calculates my weekly average mileage. Examples: 1998 to 1999 4.25 miles 1999 to 2000 4.00 2000 to 2001 5.08 2001 to 2002 7.21 2002 to 2003 7.92 2003 to 2004 7.37 What's neat about this is you can see if you're falling behind with your goals. You can also find patterns between your mileage and swimming times. My times took a major leap in the positive direction when upped my workouts from 4-5 miles to 7-8 miles per week.

Originally posted by jim thornton If you have access to a computer, you might try keeping your weekly yards on a spread sheet. Since she's posting here I take it she has access to a computer :)

Amy, I certainly don't want to discourage you from keeping a log book. Lot's of people find them useful. But,... If your logbook entries consist only of how many yards you swam, they can influence you to evaluate your training by that standard only. There are many different things that go into a balanced training plan. Refreshing and refining your stroke mechanics. Working on any or all 4 strokes or IM's; starts and turns. Training tailored to sprint, middle distance or long distance events. Building and peaking for top performance at a season ending meet. (Emmett Hines' Fitness Swimming has an excellent, succinct chapter on making a workout plan for a season. There are a number of other books that discuss this too.) So, I guess I'm saying use a logbook with awareness. Understand what your goals are, and avoid falling into the fallacy of thinking the answer to everything is to just get more yards in. Matt

I have an Application on my Palm PDA called Swimlog. Downloaded it about 2 years ago for free and it keeps a running log of yards swam. You can put in meters or yards and it does conversion for you. Very basic application, doesn't save workouts or anything like that, but if you want to track yardage it is an excellent way to do it. Look for it at CNET I think that is where I downloaded it. If it is not there I can try and email you the application, just let me know. You can email me at azperrys@cox.net

The USMS log book is available? I asked for it last year for 2003 and Tracy Grilli said it unfortunately hadn't been printed. I made very good use of the 2002 one. Is there a 2004 version?

I use an excel spreadsheet to track distance; with months across the top and the days (1 through 31) down the side. It adds up each month and calculates miles per month. It also figures totals for the year. I can't keep track of workouts or how good I did or felt but its interesting to see the distance over the year. I have this for about 5 years now.

Originally posted by Bob Boder I use an excel spreadsheet to track distance; with months across the top and the days (1 through 31) down the side. I keep track of my yardage with Excel also - I enter the yardage for each week. I also graph this year along with the previous year and the year (2000) when I had my highest annual yardage. The graphs give me a good idea about how I am doing. It also gives me a feel for how I am increasing yardage and then decreasing before a meet. Yes, Excel is useful for other things besides keeping track of money :)

I use excel also - I track yardage by stroke. And each stroke is broke into swim, pull, kick, drill. Then it totals the weekly distance and the annual distance for each of the 16 categories. It also keeps track of time and pace and calculates miles too. (I added that because non-swimmers would ask me how far I swam - I would say something like 2500 yards - and they would ask how many miles is that? I had no clue, so now it is calculated for me.) Only an engineer would keep that much detail.:cool:

Hmmmmm..... running average..... I think I will add that!:)