I have, if I'm extremely lucky, 1.5 hours a day, five days a week to train. When work or life (two toddlers and an adoring wife) interferes, I get even less. I try to swim 3 days a week, for a total of about 10-12,000 yards. I've decided I'm a scrawny wimp so I've been hitting the weights the other two days. That is hardly an ideal training regimen to be highly competitive outside of masters swimming. But that is the beauty of masters swimming. I agree with Tim L that many of us just don't have the time to do more than this. Fortunately I get to compete against my peers rather than the age-groupers who would just kill me given all the training they do.
There are plenty of masters swimmers who put in more yardage, though. I'm pretty sure those folks serious about open water swimming tend to do more. 10-12,000/week is not going to cut it on those 10K open water marathons (and probably doesn't even cut it for the 2-5k swims). There are obviously those among us focussed on pool competitions as well who train more. Those folks have a significant advantage (beyond the 50s and maybe the 100s) over those of us who can't (or won't) spend more time in the pool. More power to them! I'd probably be joining them if I could. Competing is fun! I'm (so far) glad I've gotten back into it.
I have, if I'm extremely lucky, 1.5 hours a day, five days a week to train. When work or life (two toddlers and an adoring wife) interferes, I get even less. I try to swim 3 days a week, for a total of about 10-12,000 yards. I've decided I'm a scrawny wimp so I've been hitting the weights the other two days. That is hardly an ideal training regimen to be highly competitive outside of masters swimming. But that is the beauty of masters swimming. I agree with Tim L that many of us just don't have the time to do more than this. Fortunately I get to compete against my peers rather than the age-groupers who would just kill me given all the training they do.
There are plenty of masters swimmers who put in more yardage, though. I'm pretty sure those folks serious about open water swimming tend to do more. 10-12,000/week is not going to cut it on those 10K open water marathons (and probably doesn't even cut it for the 2-5k swims). There are obviously those among us focussed on pool competitions as well who train more. Those folks have a significant advantage (beyond the 50s and maybe the 100s) over those of us who can't (or won't) spend more time in the pool. More power to them! I'd probably be joining them if I could. Competing is fun! I'm (so far) glad I've gotten back into it.
