As I crawled back into the pool today fat and out of shape, I wondered: Don't sprinters need some minimal aerobic work? I see that Ande is doing none whatsoever and Paul advises not "fighting fat" in the pool. I do a lot of race pace training and cross training. But still, is just a little aerobic work called for? I can tell I don't need any for 50s, but my 100s could use a little something. I don't think I have the substantial swimming aerobic base that people like Ande have because I was out of the pool for so many years .. So I'm either taking my 100s out too slow for fear of dying or actually dying. Does aerobic work help counter this? Or do I need more lactate work such as doing 100s with huge amounts of rest?
Just remember aerobic doesn't have to mean "long, slow and boring." Do some relatively short but challenging aerobic sets and 'aerobic' won't be such a dirty word, anymore.
Here's an example of something my team did last week:
3x (200@2:15, 150@2:15)
4x (100@1:05, 75@1:05)
We did some other stuff in between, but you get the idea. The 200 and 100 were at a pace where you had to swim pretty hard just to make the send-off, then you had a shorter swim to recover a little bit (but not too slow) before the next round.
In my opinion stuff like this is more enjoyable--and probably pays more dividends-- than 5x500 on 6:00.
Just remember aerobic doesn't have to mean "long, slow and boring." Do some relatively short but challenging aerobic sets and 'aerobic' won't be such a dirty word, anymore.
Here's an example of something my team did last week:
3x (200@2:15, 150@2:15)
4x (100@1:05, 75@1:05)
We did some other stuff in between, but you get the idea. The 200 and 100 were at a pace where you had to swim pretty hard just to make the send-off, then you had a shorter swim to recover a little bit (but not too slow) before the next round.
In my opinion stuff like this is more enjoyable--and probably pays more dividends-- than 5x500 on 6:00.
