Okay.
Do you like to swim 1 or 2 events per day @ super fast speed at meets (great times)?
Or, do you prefer to swim the max of 4 and 5 events per day (and I mean not just the sprints)?
There are pros and cons to both.
It's so choice/ cool to swim all strokes and distances but at the expense of really fast times. But it's so annoying to get out touched by a competitor who swam 6 laps that day as compared to your 34!
Yeah, depends on your goals. But what do you like to do?!
I prefer to swim no more than three per day. If it's a meet I'm really gunning for good times three is probably my limit. However, I swim plenty of meets that are more or less "training meets" where I'd like to swim fast, but really I'm more in it to get some racing experience under my belt. For these I've got no problem swimming more than three.
If it's a taper meet I swim the 3 breaststrokes. If there are events I want to swim after the last breaststroke event I'll swim them. At a non-taper meet I'll usually swim the maximum,for fun and the workout.
For shave and taper meets, I limit myself to 3 a day (because I'll probably have to swim a relay or two anyhow... and because the big meets are usually more than 1 day so I get more events in regardless). For in-season meets, I go for 4 or 5 since:
a. our pool has no blocks and meets are the only place we can practice starts
b. even a crappy meet swim will still produce a much higher speed and effort from me than I can get at practice... so an in-season meet is kind of like an ultra-high-effort practice!
I'll swim between 3-5, as many as they'll let me! I'm in it for the workout and the fun. I love competing, even if i am dead and lose 50BR grudge matches. If it isn't nationals, its all an extra long lactic acid set anyways.
The way I look at it is that it is good to get in and race when you're exhausted. We swim exhausted all the time at practice, but the racing thing I think helps prepare for that last 150 in the 500 at nationals, or the last 35y of a 100 fly...
Another thing i forgot to add is if you come to a meet and you sign up for 2 events, what happens when you have a "bad meet?" You've just totally wasted $20 or whatever, and your morning/evening on two events.
If you swim more, you've got a better shot of having at least one good swim in there, and maybe even surprise yourself.
Other thoughts:
Who here is on teams that keep records? How does your age group look? 3 years ago, we started tabulating records for our team and noticed that a lot of empty slots were on there, so a bunch of us started swimming these random events at random meets just to fill out the record book. It is certainly fun to get your name all over the place. Think of it as crosstraining in the pool.
Plus, you never know who you might end up meeting by swimming these random events. Could be your future spouse. :dunno: :joker:
4 or 5 at small, local 1-day meets.
3 max per day at Zone Champs. Just went 2 on Friday, 3 on Saturday and 2 on Sunday.
Try to limit to 2 per day at Nat's. Since I usually swim all 4 days (dist day being Thursday) I can usually get 2 days of 2 per day and 2 days of 1 per day depending on scheduling.
This was the first year I focused on just a few events for my "dual meets" but at YMCA Nationals I swam 7 events and at our state meet I swam 7 events + 4 relays. Even though I swam so many events I had at least 1 lifetime best and 2 mastsers bests each weekend. And, all 7 of my times were faster the second weekend of competition.
If you swim more, you've got a better shot of having at least one good swim in there, and maybe even surprise yourself.
Other thoughts:
Who here is on teams that keep records? How does your age group look? 3 years ago, we started tabulating records for our team and noticed that a lot of empty slots were on there, so a bunch of us started swimming these random events at random meets just to fill out the record book. It is certainly fun to get your name all over the place. Think of it as crosstraining in the pool.
Plus, you never know who you might end up meeting by swimming these random events. Could be your future spouse. :dunno: :joker:
My team does! It's fun! We still have blank spaces though.
I think if you want to do really, really well, you should only swim 2-3 events with a sufficient recovery period inbetween. I hate swimming back to back events. Depends on the difficulty of the event too, I guess. But you're in such good shape, I'm sure you could do 3 without suffering.
I think I usually swim 3-4 events per day at a meet. I don't go to many meets, so I usually like to get some times. You can still get top ten time swimming this many events. But I have also showed up to do just one event before (shoulder issue) and that was fabulous too. I know people that swear you should only swim 1-2 per day if you are going for records.
Having sad that, I think Muppet is right that you can surprise yourself with a good swim even though you are exhausted. My best swim this current year (50 free) was at the very end of a two day zones meet where I also swam 4 relays. I was utterly blasted, but still did OK. Since you are the (S)he-Man, I think you could do the same thing.
Here's another thread I started a long time ago on this topic:
ttp://forums.usms.org/showthread.php?t=6789
I'm not at the point where out touched means anything...so I swim 3 or more a day usually. I'm doing 5 on Sunday; the 3 BR's 100 IM and a 50 FR
Biggest Race is the 200 BR.
I'm also a breastroker, so I'll do those events, then pick other events so they don't interfere too much with that. I usually end up entering whatever the max per day is, with the option to scratch one.
At one meet, I would have had several hours between the events I wanted, so I did a 50 back pretty much as a filler event for fun. Did about what I expected, and kept somewhat of a warmup for my next event I wanted.
I figure if I'm going to devote a day or 2 to the swim meet, I might as well get as much out of it as I can.
