In this thread Fortress said:
Interesting Race Club thread. There was one post concluding that lactate tolerance was the key for the last 15 meters of a 100, not aerobic capacity.
Which leads to something I've been thinking about lately. I'm sure we've all had races where you try to give it everything you've got at the end and you absolutely turn to jello. I assume this is the lactic acid kicking in. When it hits you slow down very quickly. So how can we train to improve that tolerance?
Here's an article by Genadijus Sokolovas on the USA Swimming website: www.usaswimming.org/.../ViewMiscArticle.aspx
In it he talks about lactate tolerance type sets:
Anaerobic Metabolism (Anaerobic-Glycolitic) is the non-oxidative process of recycling of ATP from glycogen. Glycogen is stored in the muscle cells. Glycogen fairly rapidly recycles ATP, but it is slower than from CP. Anaerobic metabolism produces lactate. It is the main energy system for exercise bouts of 30 sec until 3 min. When distances are longer, aerobic metabolism predominates. Anaerobic metabolism has high power, middle capacity, and low efficiency.
Examples of swimming sets and distances that develop anaerobic metabolism: distances of 50 to 300 M/Y, high intensity swimming sets with a short rest interval (i.e., 6-16 x 25 M/Y, 4-8 x 50 M/Y, 2-4 x 100 M/Y, 2 x 200 M/Y with rest interval 20-30 sec etc.).
Anyway, I'm finally getting to my point here. The standard way to do this is using fixed sets like this, but has anyone tried something like swimming absolutely all-out until you hit that lactate "jello" feel where you feel yourself slowing down? At that point maybe do some very slow "active rest" swimming then repeat, etc. The goal being to build up the time/distance you can keep up that all-out speed. It seems like actually confronting that lactate wall like this would be a great way to help with lactate tolerance in races.
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Anyway, I'm finally getting to my point here. The standard way to do this is using fixed sets like this, but has anyone tried something like swimming absolutely all-out until you hit that lactate "jello" feel where you feel yourself slowing down? At that point maybe do some very slow "active rest" swimming then repeat, etc. The goal being to build up the time/distance you can keep up that all-out speed. It seems like actually confronting that lactate wall like this would be a great way to help with lactate tolerance in races.
Kirk,
I typically do two different sets of lactate sets. One is pretty much what you describe: all out 100s with lots of active recovery in between. I usually do these breaststroke and, at 9000 feet training altitude, my best times are about 1:25. The last 25 requires great concentration just to finish and to keep the stroke mechanics as good as possible. My active recovery takes place after that, with the total interval being about 10 minutes. So, that's about a 6:1 rest:work ratio. When I'm training for nationals, I'll go through 4 cycles of this during the last few weeks of hard training before taper. In the active recovery part, I'll swim freestyle at a 2 min/100 pace. In other words, barely above pool current pace but always concentrating on GOOD freestyle technique. During that 40 minute period I'll get in about 2000 yards of total swimming. Typically, my second and third swims will be the fastest with numbers 1 and 4 the slowest. I feel that this trains me for the last part of a shorter distance race.
The other kind of set is to allow the lactic acid to accumulate by doing, say, a set of 50s as fast as you can with short rest. One example for me might be 6 X 50 breaststroke on 90 sec followed by some short recovery, usually a 100 EZ. This is typically a 1:1 work:rest ratio for me. By the end of the hard swim cycle the arms and legs are so heavy that I can't easily move them and each swim requires great concentration. This mimics, to me, the feeling I get in the last few hundred of the mile.
If I lived at sea level, I'd shorten the rest period for each one because the lactic acid can be cleared out easier.
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Former Member
Anyway, I'm finally getting to my point here. The standard way to do this is using fixed sets like this, but has anyone tried something like swimming absolutely all-out until you hit that lactate "jello" feel where you feel yourself slowing down? At that point maybe do some very slow "active rest" swimming then repeat, etc. The goal being to build up the time/distance you can keep up that all-out speed. It seems like actually confronting that lactate wall like this would be a great way to help with lactate tolerance in races.
Kirk,
I typically do two different sets of lactate sets. One is pretty much what you describe: all out 100s with lots of active recovery in between. I usually do these breaststroke and, at 9000 feet training altitude, my best times are about 1:25. The last 25 requires great concentration just to finish and to keep the stroke mechanics as good as possible. My active recovery takes place after that, with the total interval being about 10 minutes. So, that's about a 6:1 rest:work ratio. When I'm training for nationals, I'll go through 4 cycles of this during the last few weeks of hard training before taper. In the active recovery part, I'll swim freestyle at a 2 min/100 pace. In other words, barely above pool current pace but always concentrating on GOOD freestyle technique. During that 40 minute period I'll get in about 2000 yards of total swimming. Typically, my second and third swims will be the fastest with numbers 1 and 4 the slowest. I feel that this trains me for the last part of a shorter distance race.
The other kind of set is to allow the lactic acid to accumulate by doing, say, a set of 50s as fast as you can with short rest. One example for me might be 6 X 50 breaststroke on 90 sec followed by some short recovery, usually a 100 EZ. This is typically a 1:1 work:rest ratio for me. By the end of the hard swim cycle the arms and legs are so heavy that I can't easily move them and each swim requires great concentration. This mimics, to me, the feeling I get in the last few hundred of the mile.
If I lived at sea level, I'd shorten the rest period for each one because the lactic acid can be cleared out easier.
