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.
This brings me back to my main question, which I think has been answered now. People swimming fast times are very focused on their training and train a lot. As to how they fit all this training in with the rest of their lives, I am still a little baffled. I am guessing most train before their day begins and they pack in family time between 6 and 9 pm and on the weekends.
I'm not claiming to be fast at anything but I think I fit my training in pretty well with the rest of my life. Today was a good example.
- up at 6:10 am, kids, dogs, breakfast.
- Left my house at 7:10 am. Biked to the gym, swam 3000 yards (main set 10x50 fly, felt strong), then biked to work. Workout time was only 1:30 because I had a 9 am meeting. Otherwise I might have stretched to 2 hours, mainly with more biking.
- Did not have time in my schedule today for a midday run.
- Biked home, took a calculated risk with That Bride by going a little bit out of my way to add mileage to help make up for the morning shortfall. Made it home just in time for dinner. Sometimes that sort of thing backfires but not today. :groovy:
- Did the dishes and then took my son to the park about 1.25 miles away. I ran there while he rode his bike. He is only 7 so I literally gave him a hand getting up the hills. Once there he played on the playground and watched a nearby little league game while I ran laps around the park and kept an eye on him. (It's a small park, we're talking 90 second laps here.) Then we came home just in time for me to help put my 5 year old daughter to bed. I ran 10K which is great for a weekday run. Total workout time for the day: 3 hours even. A little bit later I read a few pages of Harry Potter to my son to put him to bed.
- And here I am babbling on usms.org. This will not turn into a training blog, especially since I pretty much repeat the above every weekday. Sometimes I am able to run in the middle of the day, and other times I am not able to run until both kids are asleep. Some days the main set is medley and/or anaerobic. It would be the most boring blog ever.
This brings me back to my main question, which I think has been answered now. People swimming fast times are very focused on their training and train a lot. As to how they fit all this training in with the rest of their lives, I am still a little baffled. I am guessing most train before their day begins and they pack in family time between 6 and 9 pm and on the weekends.
I'm not claiming to be fast at anything but I think I fit my training in pretty well with the rest of my life. Today was a good example.
- up at 6:10 am, kids, dogs, breakfast.
- Left my house at 7:10 am. Biked to the gym, swam 3000 yards (main set 10x50 fly, felt strong), then biked to work. Workout time was only 1:30 because I had a 9 am meeting. Otherwise I might have stretched to 2 hours, mainly with more biking.
- Did not have time in my schedule today for a midday run.
- Biked home, took a calculated risk with That Bride by going a little bit out of my way to add mileage to help make up for the morning shortfall. Made it home just in time for dinner. Sometimes that sort of thing backfires but not today. :groovy:
- Did the dishes and then took my son to the park about 1.25 miles away. I ran there while he rode his bike. He is only 7 so I literally gave him a hand getting up the hills. Once there he played on the playground and watched a nearby little league game while I ran laps around the park and kept an eye on him. (It's a small park, we're talking 90 second laps here.) Then we came home just in time for me to help put my 5 year old daughter to bed. I ran 10K which is great for a weekday run. Total workout time for the day: 3 hours even. A little bit later I read a few pages of Harry Potter to my son to put him to bed.
- And here I am babbling on usms.org. This will not turn into a training blog, especially since I pretty much repeat the above every weekday. Sometimes I am able to run in the middle of the day, and other times I am not able to run until both kids are asleep. Some days the main set is medley and/or anaerobic. It would be the most boring blog ever.
