Drop Dead Taper

One thing I'd like to be able to do (and maybe Fort also), is some sort of, 'bare maintenance' with weights. Do some sort of minimum, so my muscles will still have a chance to rest up for a meet, but then after the meet when I go back to weights, I don't have that initial soreness from starting up all over again. Is something like that possible? If so, how? Tim, IMHO if you aren't sore after lifting weights you're not doing it properly...either you have not changed up your routine enough and your body has adapted or you need to lift differently/harder. Full tapers are very good thing...cycling, periodization all are needed so go for it and enjoy.

Pretty much everything Jazz has said here squares with my own personal experience. I would quibble with the statement that "stronger swimmers are faster" to add "all other things being equal," which I'm sure he meant implicitly. Otherwise Hulkster would probably be lapping me on a 100.:)

One thing I'd like to be able to do (and maybe Fort also), is some sort of, 'bare maintenance' with weights. Do some sort of minimum, so my muscles will still have a chance to rest up for a meet, but then after the meet when I go back to weights, I don't have that initial soreness from starting up all over again. Is something like that possible? If so, how? This has been my experience for what it's worth: My workouts are spaced out in such a way that I hit each muscle group every 15-17 days (as in I'm getting 15-17 days of rest per muscle group). I'll do 5 weight workouts in those 15-17 days (back, shoulders, chest, legs, arms). Each workout lasts about 50 minutes and I lift as heavy as I can with lots of rest in between sets (3-5min). My strength has remained relatively constant (a good thing I believe since most of my energy is being spent in the pool). I write this to point out that while I only lift 2 days of the week, my strength doesn't decrease. I believe that you can hold onto strength even if you take 2 weeks off. This is providing you lift as heavy as possible and go to failure (usually on one set). So, I guess I'm not offering anything in the way of "bare maintenance" but if in theory you could take 2 weeks off and still retain strength, maybe a "rest" period of minimal lifting would not have serious drawbacks? As far as the soreness goes, I've got nothing…I'm always sore 2 days after. Stretching seems to help once I get past the initial tenderness. :bouncing:

This has been my experience for what it's worth: My workouts are spaced out in such a way that I hit each muscle group every 15-17 days (as in I'm getting 15-17 days of rest per muscle group). I'll do 5 weight workouts in those 15-17 days (back, shoulders, chest, legs, arms). Each workout lasts about 50 minutes and I lift as heavy as I can with lots of rest in between sets (3-5min). My strength has remained relatively constant (a good thing I believe since most of my energy is being spent in the pool). I write this to point out that while I only lift 2 days of the week, my strength doesn't decrease. I believe that you can hold onto strength even if you take 2 weeks off. This is providing you lift as heavy as possible and go to failure (usually on one set). So, I guess I'm not offering anything in the way of "bare maintenance" but if in theory you could take 2 weeks off and still retain strength, maybe a "rest" period of minimal lifting would not have serious drawbacks? As far as the soreness goes, I've got nothing…I'm always sore 2 days after. Stretching seems to help once I get past the initial tenderness. :bouncing: For a given exercise, when you lift 1 set to failure, how many reps do you typically do? In other words, do you choose a weight where you expect you will do approximately 5 reps, or 10, or 20, etc? (For the few exercises that I do, I pick a weight where I expect to do about 15-20 reps, but I'm no expert.)

For a given exercise, when you lift 1 set to failure, how many reps do you typically do? In other words, do you choose a weight where you expect you will do approximately 5 reps, or 10, or 20, etc? (For the few exercises that I do, I pick a weight where I expect to do about 15-20 reps, but I'm no expert.) I'll usually do 2-3 warm-up sets, gradually increasing the weight to what I plan to use on my failure set. I'll shoot for a rep range between 3-6 reps. I think 1-2 reps is too close to a max lift, and if I go over 6 then I know I need to add weight. In theory you could lift to failure with any rep range, but I acquire a slight case of ADD in the gym and lose focus with anything over 10. I also focus on sprints, so I try to use my lifting time to work on strength/power vs. endurance.

swimming speed is a function of strength and conditioning relative to body proportions applied with swimming technique. hulk may be stronger in the sense that he may be able to lift press more weight but don't you weigh around 160 he's around 250 when you throw in the body shape factors and the per pound of body weight you probably smoke him you have a better boat to drag through the water and way better conditioning ande Pretty much everything Jazz has said here squares with my own personal experience. I would quibble with the statement that "stronger swimmers are faster" to add "all other things being equal," which I'm sure he meant implicitly. Otherwise Hulkster would probably be lapping me on a 100.:)

I would quibble with the statement that "stronger swimmers are faster" to add "all other things being equal," which I'm sure he meant implicitly. Otherwise Hulkster would probably be lapping me on a 100.:) Yeah I did mean that implicitly. Technique is still the number one thing.

I'll usually do 2-3 warm-up sets, gradually increasing the weight to what I plan to use on my failure set. I'll shoot for a rep range between 3-6 reps. I think 1-2 reps is too close to a max lift, and if I go over 6 then I know I need to add weight. In theory you could lift to failure with any rep range, but I acquire a slight case of ADD in the gym and lose focus with anything over 10. I also focus on sprints, so I try to use my lifting time to work on strength/power vs. endurance. Thanks! I'll try increasing weight a bit and see how it goes.