Since there is
Help my Flutter Kick is Horrible
and
Help my SDK is Horrible
I decided to begin
Help My Speed is Horrible!
a thread for swimmers who want to dramatically improve their 25 speed and times
Help My Speed is Horrible! is a Sprint improvement program
If you do it consistently you should dramatically improve your 25 swimming time.
When you improve your 25 speed
you'll improve your times in all swimming distances
especially 50's, 100's, & 200's
even 400, 500, 800, 1,000, 1,500 & 1,650 times will benefit.
Here's the Program for "Help My Speed is Horrible"
Begin with testing figure out your starting point. Where are you now?
Then train
Then retest
Test
Get your times on the following swims
1) 15 meters
2) 25
3) 50
4) 75 &
5) 100
Test the 15, 25, & 50 on one day then the 75 & 100 on a different day
put plenty of rest between each timed effort
like a very easy 75 or 125 or 175 then 3 to 7 more minutes of rest
put more rest between the longer sprints
also note
The suit you wore
Your start: how did you start each swim
(roll, push, or coaches go, )
dive from a block or side
push from in the water
Use a STOPWATCH tell the timer how you want them to time you
Report your Results in this thread
Training
1) do this set 2 or 3 times a week, 12 x 25 swim
3 EASY recovery concentrating on perfect form
1 as fast as possible for time
YOU MUST GO SUPER FAST ON THESE
IF YOU HOLD BACK AT ALL YOU'RE WASTING YOUR TIME
preferably no breath, unless your 25 time is over 20 or 25 seconds
It's OK to do more working out, just fit this set in some where in your workouts,
be consistent, one round is better than none
2) Test every Friday or Saturday
1) 3 weeks of 15, 25, & 50
2) 1 week of 25, 75 & 100
3) work on improving your flutter kick and SDK
www.usms.org/.../showpost.phpwww.usms.org/.../showpost.php
if you're working on your swimming speed, SDK and Flutter kick
do 2 x (4 x 25) swim
2 x (4 x 25) flutter kick
2 x (4 x 25) SDK
4) stretch your feet / ankles to improve your toe point
5) Lift weights to improve your strength power and speed
2 or 3 times a week
6) get a tech suit
www.usms.org/.../showpost.phpwww.usms.org/.../showpost.php
7) perfect your swimming technique
pushoff
streamline
SDK
head position
body position
arm motions
leg motions
touching the wall (the clock doesn't stop until you touch the wall)
8) Train and test for 5 weeks then
Rest one week, reduce your yardage
Mon 2 x 4 x 25
Tue easy
Wed 4 x 25
Thu easy
Friday or Saturday TEST wearing a tech suit
Report your results
9) begin another 6 week cycle
Report your test results in this fashion
(put most recent times on top)
8/10/08: 23.48
7/26: 25.92
7/6: 24.94
7/2: 25.45
5/10: 25.55
4/4: 27.18
3/29: 26.27
3/22: 27.62
3/15: 27.12
3/8: 28.0
3/1: 30.2
You should begin to see dramatic improvements in your 25 speed.
I look forward to reading your results.
Let me know if you accept this challenge
Give it a try and see what happens
Don't be fooled by how simple it is.
Are you in?
great
now you have marks to beat
do the training then see what happens
ande
Today:
Warm up,
100 free baseline is 1:06 from a push.
33.3 all out followed by easy 100.
Held most of the 33.3's at 19sec followed by 40 sec recovery, easy 100 on 2 minutes.
Did it 10 times.
cooldown.
Will do this at least once a week and test the 33.3, 66.6 and 100 around the 5th week.
I've been having trouble sticking to this. Mostly because I don't have a reliable way of timing myself, and I can't find a place to fit test practices in. If I swim them at the end of practice, I'm tired. If I swim them instead of practice, I'm missing a practice. Right now I have my schedule like this-
Mon/Wed - Hard swim + lifting
Tues/Thurs - Easier, but faster swim, abs
Fri - lifting + recovery practice
I try to catch my times whenever we do sprints (usually at the end of practice), Wednesday was my hardest practice this week and the end was 4x25 sprint. I did the first one in 13 and the rest in 15. This was coming after a pretty intense lift earlier in the day and a really intense swim. I'm not sure how it translates into rested pace, but I do have a meet in the middle of October where I'll be able to measure my progress.
nice job
keep working on it
you'll keep getting faster
ande
I did 2 50s sprint at the end of practice and went 24 and then 25. I know I can do better than that (I took way too many breaths). But it's still pretty decent for me. I tend to go much slower in practice than when I race, but I'm trying to work on that.
I did 2 50s sprint at the end of practice and went 24 and then 25. I know I can do better than that (I took way too many breaths). But it's still pretty decent for me. I tend to go much slower in practice than when I race, but I'm trying to work on that.
Did "fast Friday" today since I can't get to the pool tomorrow. I started with 33.3's all out. Did two and held 19's, then my training partners showed and I was "forced" to change the workout to four all out 100's with easy 100 recovery. Held first three at 1:13's. I admit I held back a little. As punishment I did the fourth 100 fly/back/*** and held 1:30.
Next week I will be sure I do the 10x fast 33's!
congrats on your improvements
I don't agree that the *** catch is the same as fly
fly
you catch then press down and through
***
you out sweep, in sweep then thrust.
there's plenty of info on
www.breaststroke.info
plus watch underwater youtube videos of the best
in fly
hands and forearms are beneath your elbows
perpendicular to the surface
in ***
hands and forearms tend to stay even with your elbows
parallell to the surface
if your *** pull is like a half fly pull
you bury your forearms and hands then have to "dig" them out
which creates lot of drag
watch what the best breastrokers do
basically the pull helps set up the kick
when elite breastrokers kick their upper bodies are streamlined to maximize distance
I changed my breaststroke this week. An old friend of mine, who happens to be an excellent breaststroker and a coach, was in town this last weekend. He looked at my stroke and gave me a crapload of pointers and drills to try.
The tip he gave me that really seems to be helping is that the catch should be the same as it is in butterfly. I was thinking about that yesterday and started doing some drills where I'd do 2-3 fly strokes and then a couple of *** strokes, trying to maintain the same feel on the catch. Then I'd swim 100 ***. I swam my first ever sub-1:20 practice 100 breaststroke yesterday (1:17).
My training set times have gone down 1-2s per 50 since I started trying to be more fly-like with my breaststroke. My stroke feels a lot more fluid now, and I can really feel the difference in that it feels like I'm continuously moving instead of the more herky-jerky motion I was using before. I feel like I've had a breaststroke epiphany. Hopefully it's not just an anomalous couple of days