What stroke do you personally train the most?

I think that the reality of a quality masters program is that the coach or coaches will devise workouts to fit the need of their swimmers. On our team, we have fitness swimmers, some national caliber pool competitors and some top ocean swimmers along with triatheletes. The workouts will vary by individual and depending on the time of year and what races are pending. Our triatheletes will taper to fit their race needs. Our pool and ocean swimmers will do a lot of free this time of year, along with weights to improve strength and cardio. As racing season and nationals approach, more stroke work is done by those who focus on particular strokes, as sprinters work on sprints and distance swimmers do their thing. During ocean season, lots of distance as well as sprint work to improve strength. A good masters program will, IMHO, have different things going on all around. And your teammates will adjust as well. Like this morning when we decided to do the first 4 of our 8 x 200 set as IM instead of free. And on just one other small matter, 100 is not really much of a warmup. You might want to up that. We usually do about 1200 meters of warmup stuff including, depending on the day, swims, pulls, kicks, drills, backstroke and breaststroke. That's the "reality" of a good masters program imho.

Originally posted by botterud I think that the reality of a quality masters program is that the coach or coaches will devise workouts to fit the need of their swimmers. On our team, we have fitness swimmers, some national caliber pool competitors and some top ocean swimmers along with triatheletes. The workouts will vary by individual and depending on the time of year and what races are pending. Our triatheletes will taper to fit their race needs. Our pool and ocean swimmers will do a lot of free this time of year, along with weights to improve strength and cardio. As racing season and nationals approach, more stroke work is done by those who focus on particular strokes, as sprinters work on sprints and distance swimmers do their thing. During ocean season, lots of distance as well as sprint work to improve strength. A good masters program will, IMHO, have different things going on all around. And your teammates will adjust as well. Like this morning when we decided to do the first 4 of our 8 x 200 set as IM instead of free. Yes I agree and that would be awesome. However, most places you go (at least in my experience in the area where I live and the masters I looked into), you don't get anything other than swim x sets of 800 yards at this pace. You are done for the day. It is very disappointing. And on just one other small matter, 100 is not really much of a warmup. You might want to up that. We usually do about 1200 meters of warmup stuff including, depending on the day, swims, pulls, kicks, drills, backstroke and breaststroke. 1200 for warmup -- I am impressed! But personally it sounds pretty crazy and it's not something I will ever be able to or want to do. Warmup litereally means getting yourself warm and heart rate up. To swim 1200 meters is pretty much the whole workout for a lot beginner to intermedidate swimmers. It would take 20 minutes to finish at a mild warmup speed, all freestyle, EVEN IF you don't stop and rest. I can't imagine that you wouldn't be beyond warm at that point. I guess it all depends on what the goal of your training is. Perhaps that approach works for triathletes or really long distance swimmers. But I doubt that short distance swimmers do such long warmups. Also keep in mind the longest race in breaststroke is only 200 meters. You may also have heard of the difference between fast-twitch and slow-twitch muscles. I have plenty of the the former and very little of the latter, which genetically determines that I can never go miles and miles as someone with a lot of the slow-twitch muscles will be able to do. :D

Well, I think that our views of "warm-up" are different. It's used not just to get the heart going, but to get the muscles and joints prepared for hard work . . . getting the body to lube up the joints and get the connective tissues loose . . . 1200 is just about right for this almost 50 year old body to get ready to do hard sets. Without it . . . shoulder/elbow pain/injuries and tightness. And yes, the first 20 to 30 minutes of our 1.5 hour practice is used warming up. Total yardage is usually 4,000 to 5,000. Sprinters generally do less overall yardage, but the same warmup. And yes, these are the competitive and experienced swimmers. There are lanes that do much less overall yardage . . . but the warm up does not vary by more than a few hundred. It's the main sets that differ more for the beginning/intermediate level athletes.

Originally posted by swiminton "If you told a 100m runner that the best way to optimise his sprint technique at maximum speed would be to complete many miles a week at 10k pace, you would be laughed off the track!" I don't personally swim events that last approximately ten seconds so this is completely irrelevant to me. I completely disagree with your statement that "most people will be warm after a few laps." I need a lot longer than that to really loosen up, and I suspect most people are similar. And, yes, you do need 40 minutes to get ready to swim at a meet--that's why we warm up. Most people will warm up for that amount of time at the start of the meet and then maybe get in for just a couple minutes just before their events (with a similar cool down after each event). Finally, make no mistake, I'm doing plenty of high intensity swimming in my workouts, but I don't get right into the high intensity stuff. I properly warm up first and this is usually 20 minutes minimum. I think I already said this, but just because we're calling it a warmup doesn't imply we're just sort of splashing around out there. A warmup should be of gradually increasing intensity.

swiminton, By your own admission you've only been swimming for a short time. I've been swimming a long time and I don't claim to know everything, but I do know you're wrong :) I don't really think the fact that I'm a distance swimmer has much to do with it. I'll wager that if you asked 100 (experienced) swimmers and coaches if they think only swimming 100-200 yards of warmup is a good idea about 99 would say no. Maybe 100.

Originally posted by knelson I think you're wrong there. Sprinters probably warm up just as much if not more than distance swimmers. 1200 yards isn't really that much. We sometimes do up to around 2000 or so. This isn't all just slow swimming, though. Maybe the first few hundred is just to get loosened up, but from then on you'll probably be varying your speed including maybe some short fast swimming to get your heart rate up. And, yes, the vast majority of competitive swimmers at all levels will train more freestyle than anything else. I'm guessing even splitting 50/50 with another stroke is somewhat atypical. With due respect, to do that much as warmup is simply a curious concept to me. I can see the point of loosening up your joints for someone with less flexible joints due to aging (as butterud pointed out), but for many others I don't see the point. Most people will be warm after a few laps (imagine you need 20-40 minutes to get into the real swim status at a meet?). I especially don't believe this is true for competitive swimmers. I have read in many sources that although a lot of swimmers think doing laps after laps for miles and miles will make them a faster swimmer, that really is not the way to go. The key is technique and intensity. The importance of technique is even more apparent in the other three strokes. If that's the case, how can you expect to improve the other three strokes when you barely have time to practice them beacuse you already spend most of your time on freestyle. If you do some searches on the web, you will find plenty of articles supporting the research findings that you don't become a faster better swimmer simply because you can swim 5000 meters per workout. For example, www.pponline.co.uk/.../0952.htm I like this article because it compares swimming to running. "If you told a 100m runner that the best way to optimise his sprint technique at maximum speed would be to complete many miles a week at 10k pace, you would be laughed off the track!" One of its findings: "Over the whole season the swimmers who made the biggest improvements were those who performed more of their training at higher paces. The volume of training had no influence on swim performance. " In any case, this is what I believe. In no way am I advocating making your workout so easy that you barely feel you get anything done. All I am saying is that intensity is extremely important, and you can achieve intensity better in a shorter amount of time by simulating your training to your race as much as possible.

Originally posted by swiminton Michael Phelps trains his fly mostly at 50-100m intervals at race pace. He never goes beyond 200m per set. Nor does he swim a couple thousands yards free just to warmup. All this is to conserve his energy and efficiently use it to train at high intensity. USA Swimming has some sample workouts courtesy of Bob Bowman that you can take a look at: www.usaswimming.org/.../ViewMiscArticle.aspx I think you'll see that he typically does at least 2,000 yards warmup. No, it isn't all all free, but I never suggested that warmup should be all free.

All organized workouts I have ever been in spent about 1/4 of the time or yardage doing "warmup". As Knelson says, warmup is a variety of strokes, drills, pulling, kicking, distances, and intensities (but never anaerobic or threshold sets.) Whether this is a good training idea is one issue, but the fact of its presence in swimming programs is not debatable. Track sprinters spend all day walking easy. Spending 20 or 30 minutes swimming easy is not unreasonable.

I get in trouble with other swimmers on my masters team because I train almost 100% freestyle. I swim free and fly in competition including an occasional 200 fly. One member always comments to me, "How can you swim fly in competition but never train for it?" I do actually train butterfly a little but admit it is far less than most. I guess when I get strong enough to be "in shape" for the free the fly is just there.

Originally posted by knelson I don't personally swim events that last approximately ten seconds so this is completely irrelevant to me. The point of this analogy is NOT about how long your race is. It is about the DIFFERENCE between your race and your training. A sprint runner of 100 meters will probably run no more than 1000 meters at moderate pace to warm up just before the race. Keep in mind in swimming you are against more resistance than in running. Therefore the difference between your warmup and your race should be smaller. So if you race is 200 meters (swim), I can't imagine that you will need more than 400 meters to warmup. Plus, there is plenty of other things such as stretching to help you get loosened up. I guess you just have to ask yourself: what is the point of warming up? If the point of is to get yourself warm and loosend up, then wouldn't it be better to be able to achieve that goal in the shortest amount time possible and with the greatest amount of energy conservation possible? why would you want to waste your energy in warmup that you could have otherwise spend in the race? If you feel you are warm enough, then don't waste any more time and energy in warming up. On the other hand, if you just can't get loosened up and get yourself into the race mode unless you must go 30-40 minutes first, then I'd say go for it. To me, that just doens't sound like the most efficient way to use your energy. I personally don't need that much time. A few laps where I focus really hard on rotation and streamlining will get me there, but again my interest is no in long distance swims. Kirk, I think your profile says your speciality is distance free, so it makes sense that your warmup and training will be longer than average. In your case, your race is probably just as long as your warmup and training sets. But for people who are only going to swim 50-200m races, it is the pace of training not the volume of training that will improve your speed.