I know that I have seen others talk about "how good am I if I swim the 200 in this time", or "if my mile is 17min".
and then the responses are typically, look at results from previous meets, or last years top 10 time.
But does anyone try to take into account how many actually swim that event/distance? Is one a good swimmer merely because only 12 people swim the 400 IM.
I looked at the 2007 top 10 SCM for Men 30-34. for *** and IM I would have been top 10 in 3 of 6 events/distances.
50 br 33.37 outside of top 10
100br 1:14.08 (10)
200br 2:42.20 (7)
400 IM 5:19.71 (7)
but how many 30-34 competed in those events in 2007? I would guess that more people competed in 2006 at the World Championships in Cali.
In Sweden I have top 10 times in nearly everything but 50-100 free, but that is only because it's not too often that there are more than 10-12 swimmers in my age grupp. I know of 4-6 swimmers that will be 35-39 in 2010 and all of them are significanly faster than me, just not sure swimming at the Worlds is something they plan on doing.
I recently looked at a German time standard, since they had one for every year 11-18 and then an open I used the open table. The table was scaled to 1-20. 20 being the fastest. something simliar to the US AAAA standards but with more divisions. I was at best 6 of a possible 20 in Breaststroke. and not even 1 in Back and Fly. and between 1-2 for Free and IM. to me that seems more like a realistic measurement of my ability.
There are people on my team who have broken USMS national records for their age groups in workout.
I'm skeptical of this claim. I don't know a single ultra fast swimmer who doesn't compete and breaks records in practice. I guess it surely is possible but that person would have a serious swimming pedigree and a background of competition. Especially since Austin, the national records are very tough, most made wearing new tech suits.
I don't like your new name. I want (S)he-Man back.
I would also like to say if you are good enough to break records, you aren't a casual swimmer and probably have superior training methods, or a plan anyway. Busting out a national record at practice is also much different from a meet situation. I, too, want names, events, etc. I swim with some smoking fast guys and even on their best practice days they aren't coming close to a prepared meet performance.
I don't like your new name. I want (S)he-Man back.
I really must concur.
I know some fast people, masters WR holders even, who don't compete much. But I'm quite sure they're not breaking records in practice ...
Maybe there's some young stud Olympians still in primo shape doing this ... seems unlikely. I've heard this claim before on the forum ...
There are people on my team who have broken USMS national records for their age groups in workout. These same people do not compete. Be wary of ranking yourself according to the people who currently compete. There are a lot of other fast swimmers out there. At the same time, I think a top ten time is still a significant achievement and congratulations to anyone who can achieve them, regardless of participation.
We also have a few of these folks who sometimes workout with my team. Basically they're triathletes who aren't interested in swim meets. Overall, my team has a pretty low percentage of swimmers who do any meets (myself included).
I'm calling serious BS on these claims unless you are talking young post Olympians. Given the level of training by 35+ athletes these days and some of the serious studs out there at meets, I'm not buying for a second there is a practice national record breaker.
No triathlete is dropping into practice and breaking records, no way, no how.
I'm sure there are others on this forum who could validate my claim about record-breaking swimmers who don't compete. Maybe they would chime in as well to help support my statement. I would be very uncomfortable with giving out names--even my own as you can tell by this forum. Surely I'm not the only person on a team with individuals like these.
Then how about just saying what times they're swimming for what event?
I'm also on the breaking records in practice wagon of doubt. I've perused the records and while there are some 'soft' ones, I'm not sure how someone could be breaking them in practice as you are talking about non-rested, hand (or clock) timed, from a push, non-tech suit swims in less than world class conditions. But hey, I've been wrong before.
I have a workout partner who could,he just aged up to 60 fairly recently and he is swimming well again.He refuses to compete any more as he says he's done all he wants to.You may have heard of him,Don Schollander.(By the way,I don't do his workouts,I'm over in the corner doing my BR drills.)
I will concede, as with Hulk, that certain times are soft. But, in the 35-54 age range, I would be highly surprised to see someone pull a national record in practice. Under 35 and over 60 I can see it, although there are some really really fast 60+ guys out there in meets.
