How much endurance training?

And to Slowfish, I have been swimming the one mile triathlon swim for, now, this will be my 6th year and I am almost 59. I never look at it as a one-mile swim, I break mine down into 4x400 swims and train accordingly. If a swimmer can do repeat 400s or even 200s relatively quickly with minimum rest, then the mile will more seem like a pleasant experience. But you have to train at lower yardage and higher intensity with rest, of course, to get there. Swimming a mile does not necessarily produce a fast mile. And when I had a great 800m free back in the Masters Nationals some 11 years ago or so, I had never swam the 800 free in total; I always broke it up into intervals. So, I think and it is my opinion only, that endurance is necessary, but to produce a solid swim of a mile or less at a faster time, interval training is a must. A swimmer must get used to swimming fast in training because when race day comes about, they are better prepared if they choose to "take it out."Donna This is good advice. Most tris work on their swimming a lot in the off-season. Good time to work on technique and build some endurance because, come spring, swimming usually gets the back burner. If you can't do longer swims/intervals without stroke difficulties, start with the sets of 200s or so that Allen recommends. When your start to improve, you can do longer intervals/sets and then gradually knock down the interval time and pick up speed. At some point, you might want to do a benchmark swim at your target distance of 800 or 1500. Then go back to the interval training and take aim at your benchmark again.

And to Slowfish, I have been swimming the one mile triathlon swim for, now, this will be my 6th year and I am almost 59. I never look at it as a one-mile swim, I break mine down into 4x400 swims and train accordingly. If a swimmer can do repeat 400s or even 200s relatively quickly with minimum rest, then the mile will more seem like a pleasant experience. But you have to train at lower yardage and higher intensity with rest, of course, to get there. Swimming a mile does not necessarily produce a fast mile. And when I had a great 800m free back in the Masters Nationals some 11 years ago or so, I had never swam the 800 free in total; I always broke it up into intervals. So, I think and it is my opinion only, that endurance is necessary, but to produce a solid swim of a mile or less at a faster time, interval training is a must. A swimmer must get used to swimming fast in training because when race day comes about, they are better prepared if they choose to "take it out."Donna This is good advice. Most tris work on their swimming a lot in the off-season. Good time to work on technique and build some endurance because, come spring, swimming usually gets the back burner. If you can't do longer swims/intervals without stroke difficulties, start with the sets of 200s or so that Allen recommends. When your start to improve, you can do longer intervals/sets and then gradually knock down the interval time and pick up speed. At some point, you might want to do a benchmark swim at your target distance of 800 or 1500. Then go back to the interval training and take aim at your benchmark again.