Looking at one-hour results, and just finishing New England Masters SCY Championships at Harvard, how is it that older swimmers are getting faster and faster, and pretty much everyone is getting faster and faster compared to a few years ago when there seemed to be more mortal swimmers?
What are older (45+ women; at this point 65+ men) swimmers doing that keeps them at such elite levels? Weights? Extensive training? How much of both? How do they have jobs and families and train? The field of fast swimmers is getting deeper and deeper. Anyone have idea as to why?
I want to know the secrets. Are the people who race now self-selecting more and more as elite swimmers? Has everyone swum all their lives? I know to swim hard you have to train hard, but I am baffled by sudden increase in amazing fast times and so many records getting broken.
Most of the elite level masters swimmers I know and a few that I train with do not have families. Some may be married and have jobs, but I can't think of anyone that I know that is consistently getting top 10 times that has kids. I'm not saying thats a universal truth, just an observation.
Your observation doesn't match mine either. The very fastest swimmers I know don't seem any more or less likely to me than the average-speed swimmers to have children at home (which is what I will assume you mean by "families"), or to have demanding jobs. Some do; some don't. Also, "elite" masters may spend more time on training than people who don't really take swimming seriously, but I don't know that they spend more time on training (in or out of the pool) than other people who do take swimming seriously but whose personal best happens to be slower than top-ten range.
I think a cultural shift may have something to do with it. When I was a kid, sports were for kids. Grownups maybe played softball but that was about it. My hometown had a strong kids' swim program and no adult program at all; now I understand that it has a masters team. With more opportunities for people to continue participating and competing at a high level even long after they are kids, and with more people keeping up the good work, the overall level of achievement has got to increase.
Most of the elite level masters swimmers I know and a few that I train with do not have families. Some may be married and have jobs, but I can't think of anyone that I know that is consistently getting top 10 times that has kids. I'm not saying thats a universal truth, just an observation.
Your observation doesn't match mine either. The very fastest swimmers I know don't seem any more or less likely to me than the average-speed swimmers to have children at home (which is what I will assume you mean by "families"), or to have demanding jobs. Some do; some don't. Also, "elite" masters may spend more time on training than people who don't really take swimming seriously, but I don't know that they spend more time on training (in or out of the pool) than other people who do take swimming seriously but whose personal best happens to be slower than top-ten range.
I think a cultural shift may have something to do with it. When I was a kid, sports were for kids. Grownups maybe played softball but that was about it. My hometown had a strong kids' swim program and no adult program at all; now I understand that it has a masters team. With more opportunities for people to continue participating and competing at a high level even long after they are kids, and with more people keeping up the good work, the overall level of achievement has got to increase.
