life time best times and best times in each age group

Jeff is an oddity, but the thing is, he's incredible at breastroke and pretty good at back stroke ie he went 53.7 in the 100 *** and 50.8 in the 100 back though he cleans up the back sprint events in masters tracey caulkins swam every stroke well, katie swims every stroke well too, give her a very well rounded IM michael phelps has a very good breastroke but it's his weakest when you compare it to his other 3 my breastroke is tolerable in a college quadrathlon in '85 i did a 50 *** in 27.6 I'd be hard pressed to do one under 30 now i think my best *** split in the 200 IM was a 32.5, 34.6 as a master I tend to do better when I do some kicking and a lot of technique work it's rare to find swimmers who are great at both *** and back ande No. It's going to take more than a couple examples to convince me that the back-*** super combo is not an anomoly. Even Jeff describes it as an "oddity." I'm sure you have more examples in that encyclopediac brain. :bow: I guess there's Tracey Caulkins off the top of my head. And I'm sure there are some elite IMers that are proficient at both like Katie Hoff. But, apart from the super elite, on this forum and in my own more limited swimming experience and observations, back and breaststroke just typically don't go together. (I know the Raz can do quadrathlons.) That's one reason we have a lot of breaststroke haters and backstroke haters on the forum. (Sorry, Allen, I know you don't like that "hate" word. I use it loosely.)

it's rare to find swimmers who are great at both *** and back ande When I first started swimming summer league at age 12, the coach tried to push me into backstroke, I am guessing because of my height (just under 6 ft, even at 12) because I can't think of any other reason. However, I naturally excelled at breaststroke, eventually holding the league record for the 100. I suffer through backstroke to get through IM's.

Hey Robin...we have very close times on these! :D Are you working on reducing the times still? SwimStud.... Yes, I am always working on reducing my times! But, it has been very hard for me to improve my times during the last year. I have come to accept that the times I swam in high school were in a different lifetime.

100 *** 15-18 years old 1:16 35-39 years old 1:28.6 200 *** 15-18 years old 2:37.1 35-39 years old 3:11.5 Hey Robin...we have very close times on these! :D Are you working on reducing the times still?

Thanks for the compliments, everyone. Yes, Ande, I am "amazing" in the *** and "pretty good" in the back. But if Eddie had just let me train more backstroke in college, if only to improve my IM, I could have done better. And again, I never shaved a 100 yard back in college, so it's hard to say how fast I might have been then. People like me are indeed rare. If it were more common, they wouldn't schedule back and *** events consecutively at nearly every meet.

Jeff- of course they still would. It is well-known that Meet Directors are slavish worshippers of butterflyers and always slant things in their favour.

No. It's going to take more than a couple examples to convince me that the back-*** super combo is not an anomoly. Even Jeff describes it as an "oddity." I'm sure you have more examples in that encyclopediac brain. :bow: I guess there's Tracey Caulkins off the top of my head. And I'm sure there are some elite IMers that are proficient at both like Katie Hoff. But, apart from the super elite, on this forum and in my own more limited swimming experience and observations, back and breaststroke just typically don't go together. (I know the Raz can do quadrathlons.) That's one reason we have a lot of breaststroke haters and backstroke haters on the forum. (Sorry, Allen, I know you don't like that "hate" word. I use it loosely.) I'm probably showing what a dork I am, but this one got me interested, so like Kevin (Speedo Racer) did with the swim magazine covers, I did with the records for Back and *** by the same swimmer. During the NFL football games yeserday, I got out the old USMS Rule Books where they have all of the records, and did some research...yes, I'm one of the weirdos who happens to keep them. From 1990 when they listed the Nationals Records there appears to be 20 swimmers who have had National Records in backstroke and breastroke. This does not include swimmers like Jeff Cummings who have won these events at Nationals & World Championships and does not include swimmers who have ranked Number #1 in both of these events, like Jeff, Phil Whitten, and Nadine Day. The list is just USMS recordholders and this list only goes back to 1990 and does not cover people from 1989 on back. Besides the three I mentioned, these are other swimmers I found that had USMS records in both strokes. Clara Walker, Jewel Cooke, Ella Peckham, Wally Spence, Tom Lane, Maxine Merlino, Regan Kenner, Sergey Mariniuk, Jim Penfield, Gus Langer, Lavell Stoinoff, Dan Dotterweich, Gail Roper, Mark Chatfield, Aldo Da Rosa, Sarabeth Schweitzer, and Thomas Cureton. So from this list I would say its not quite the oddity in USMS as one would expect. I am sure this list would be bigger if you took all of the USMS National Meet Champions and the USMS Swimmers ranked #1 in these events in the National Top Ten.

Hi Ande, Enjoy following the daily workouts on your blog. Almost feel like I'm in the Swim Center with you. I've only given my sprint free times since backstroke and fly times have slowed considerably since shoulder surgery in 2003. 50 yard free 25.69 1992 age 38 26.00 1994 age 40 26.37 1999 age 45 26.76 2005 age 52 I think my best time as an age grouper was 26.0 (1966 or 67) 100 yard free 57.05 1991 age 37 56.73 1994 age 40 58.26 1999 age 45 59.04 2005 age 52 Best age group time was about 57.5 Look forward to seeing you at Zones in March.

Started swimming when I was 41 so I don't have alot of data. 50 yd free 28.70 AGE 41 26.45 AGE 42 100 yd free 1:08.76 AGE 41 1:04.00 AGE 42 200 yd free 2:56.98 AGE 41 2:31.39 AGE 42

500 Free 1970 (20) 5:37.42 Division III Trenton State College (NJ) 1983 (30 - 34) 6:01.0 1984 (35 - 39) 5:55.2 2002 (50 - 54) 5:35.34 2005 ( 55 - 59) 5:33.0 lifetime best 1000 Free 1970 ( 20) 11:56.2 2005 ( 55-59) 11:55.8 lifetime best