Last meet I swam the 100 and 200 IM, the latter for the first time ever. My best strokes are free and fly. My backstroke is quite lame. My breaststroke is slowly getting better. I have no illusions that I will ever get anywhere near a top ten in anything, least of all an IM event. But I would like to improve, and it give me a sense of accomplishment to swim all four strokes in a race and not drown (though the 200 introduced doubt on that front!)
I went 1:16.80 in the 100 (out in 35.83; back in 40.97)
In the 200, I went 2:51.82
fly 34.65
back 46.81
*** (falling piano) 53.83
free 36.53
The 200 was really a mixed bag--it felt absolutely horrible in the middle (why, oh why did I enter this event??? I am thinking about 20 yards into the breaststroke leg) but exciting to complete.
Any suggestions about IM sets for workouts (I swim alone, for the most part) or ways to think about the 200 race? Split goals, etc?? I'm sort of plateaued elsewhere, so this seems like a good thing to work on for awhile. My zone meet is at the end of this month, and I'd like to get the 200 down around 2:45 if possible.
I'm not half the swimmer of most of
the posters here, but here are my $0.02.
You might want to try workouts #6 and #10 here:
ruthkazez.com/LunchSwims.html
There are also lots of IM workouts here:
ruthkazez.com/50swimworkouts.html
Based on your 200 splits and the fact that your
50 *** is 40.65, I would agree that your
weakest link is the back. One idea to work on
that is to do "Buldge" IMs where you throw in an
extra leg of the stroke that you want to focus on.
In your case, a 1000 yd buldge IM set would be:
8x(25 fly, 50 back, 25 ***, 25 free)
Improved fittness should speed up the *** leg
since you know that you have more breaststroke
speed in you, if you can just dodge the piano
before you get there.
I'm not half the swimmer of most of
the posters here, but here are my $0.02.
You might want to try workouts #6 and #10 here:
ruthkazez.com/LunchSwims.html
There are also lots of IM workouts here:
ruthkazez.com/50swimworkouts.html
Based on your 200 splits and the fact that your
50 *** is 40.65, I would agree that your
weakest link is the back. One idea to work on
that is to do "Buldge" IMs where you throw in an
extra leg of the stroke that you want to focus on.
In your case, a 1000 yd buldge IM set would be:
8x(25 fly, 50 back, 25 ***, 25 free)
Improved fittness should speed up the *** leg
since you know that you have more breaststroke
speed in you, if you can just dodge the piano
before you get there.
