I am hitting the wall

Are you talking about your time on a 50 within an interval set, or are you talking about a 50 done from a dive with lots of rest beforehand?

within interval set but from rest - time is the same jjpj How long were you away from swimming before you came back 4 weeks ago? What kind of times were you doing before on a similar set? What is your swimming history, i.e. what events did you compete in?

You are still pretty young and may yet see some lifetime PRs. I hope you will, however, forgive me for lecturing at you a little bit. I've coached both age-groupers and masters swimmers, so hopefully I can help you a little here. Five thousand yards, after being out for a period of time is an easy thing for a 20 year old to jump right into, but not so for somebody who is 30. As a coach, I would tell you that you may be broken down from taking on this much yardage so soon. The yardage is fine for a masters swimmers, but you've started out at what is probably on the high end for most masters swimmers. I know you don't want to hear that because you seem excited about your swimming. Try this experiment - try taking off two days this week, say tomorrow and Friday. You've put in four good weeks so far of training, so this won't hurt you. Next week, resume your regular schedule and see if you don't feel stronger. Also, be patient. It takes time when you are older to get back to where you were. If you do this right, you could be faster than you were in HS, especially on the shorter things. On 50s, I'd say breathe as needed and breathe as little as possible. Breathing patterns are for longer swims. On your 50, I'd say think more about your kick than any particular breathing pattern. How strong is your kick right now? Improving your kick will guarantee a faster 50. I would be curious to know your goals. Are you wanting to compete in the shorter distances (50s or 100s), middle distance, or distance?

Weights, in my mind, make a huge difference on sprints, so I would encourage you to do them. Again, be careful with how much you take on when you start. Best to start with low weights and high reps to get used to the motion before you go to heavy weights. You might want to consider buying Ed Nessel's book, Swim to Win. He has some great tips on weight-training for swimmers in his book not to mention some great swimming advice and training ideas. Glad you are considering a couple of days off. I bet it will pay off. Some athletes use training cycles where they have three weeks of intense training and then have a week of recovery (backing down on how much they do) before they go back to the three weeks of intense training. Periodization and individualization are the buzz words in training these days. It can be fun to design your plan.

I'm 34 and started back up after 10yrs. I started off swimming 3000-3500m in 90 minutes. it took me 4-6 weeks to get up to 4000m and I thought that was tough. it's taken me 2 yrs to get to were I can swim 5500m in 90. I can say that for me speed was the last thing to come. I was able to drop my 100, 200 and 400 times in practice long before I was able to go under :35 from the wall. I raced the 50 several times during the two years back and had 28.77-29-11 it wasn't until after this summer that I did 27.76 and then 2 weeks later 27.68. I'm not coach, but if if can swim 50s in a series at :34 but only :32 with rest, I would guess your getting too much rest in your series, or you are stressing and cutting your stroke short in the rested 50. try doing a 9x50 progressive 1-3 building up speed over the 3 50's. start interval :50-:55 try swimming the first 50 :42, then :37 and then really push the last one. do that 3 times. pay attention to your arms, and legs. see how much your stroke changes as your speed increases. last night I did 5x100 neg *** and did :46 - :44 but I was taking 3-4 more strokes per 25 in the second 50. so I really need to work on that. I should be able to swim it :46-:43 with out increasing my stroke count that much.

within interval set 34sec from rest - time is 32sec jjpj

Actually i was on team when in HS but that was...years ago. i did compete in 'old days' I am 30 now. jjpj

-ok that's good idea I'll take 2 days off this week.(haven't thought about it since i don't feel so tired after practice) -The reason why i swim 4500-5000/day is that i do not feel worn out-just sleepy. Of course at the beginning i could hardly keep up-but now is no issue. -i am working on my kick-that's definitely needs work-we do have kick sets evrryday -Are you wanting to compete in the shorter distances (50s or 100s), middle distance, or distance? -> 50's and 100's-i'd like to compete(i don't now but in my mind i feel the need for speed) but only when i know i have much better speed.obviously i am working on it and enjoy doing it! -do you suggest weight training? thanks ! :agree:

it's 50 meters in short course pool-we do pull, kick, sprints, etc. For the original poster - you say you swim so many YARDS per day but you are not happy with your 50 METER time. Please confirm what distance you are swimming. 32 seconds for a long course 50 meters freestyle is a reasonably fast time. It is not so fast for 50 yards short course. You also did not say how you swim those 4500 yds per day. What kinds of sets? Are most of your workouts similar from day to day? Do you train in a long course pool or short course pool? I am not sure your coach knows what he is doing if he tells you to improve your endurance. Swimming a fast 50 doesn't require much endurance at all. It requires some power and good sprinting technique.

Also, try to vary your workout a little bit. There are some excellent suggestions throughout this post so definitely take those into consideration as well! You can vary up your sprint sets by throwing in 75 yard/meter sprints. the 75's really help that sprint speed, but they also help improve endurance as well. Just a thought as you make your moves forward.