Hi, All. I am looking for some guildance. I am looking to improve my swimming technique and fitness.
I am 45 and I would characterize myself as a beginner-plus. I did swim in high school; although, I was not terribly competitive - "participate on the team" is probably a better description :) That was almost 30 years ago.
About 6 months ago, I began swimming at a local pool (SCM). I currently swim 3 times per week, as follows:
Day 1 - 2000 total meters - 500 free wu; 5x100 r0:20, 5x75 r0:15, 5x50 r0:10, 5x25 r0:05 (all free); 5x50 back r0:15 wd (total time 50+ min)
Day 2 - 2000 total meters - 400 free wu; 5x50, 3x100, 1x200, 3x100, 5x50 r0:15 (all free); 400 *** wd (total time 50+ min)
Day 3 - 2000 free w/out stopping (total time approx 45 min)
I breath only on my left side and I am breathing every time I take a stroke with my left arm. I notice that I am using my right arm to leverage/life my body to breath. I would like to step up my distance and intensity of my workouts, and I would like to learn alternate strokes (***, fly and back). I am concerned that if I increase workout distances, etc. without first improper technique, I may injure myself. I am starting to notice an ache in my right sholder and clearly my right sholder and arm is working harder than my left (and definitely feels as though it is)- that can't be good :(. Flip turns have not been in the picture :)
So, my free style technique obvioulsy needs a lot of work. My *** and back even need even more; and my butterfly is non-existent.
I have swam a few times at a local masters practice, but there does not seem to be much individualized attention - Please understand, I am not being critical, it just doesn't seem to be the way that that group is set up. Because of family commitments, my optimum routine practice time is very early in the AM; other local master programs seem to be evening oriented, and the reality is that I just cannot make those practices.
My thought is that if I could get some one-on-one attention, that I could then better benefit/participate into a group/master workouts.
My problem is that I am having difficulty locating someone that can help one on one. One option is to try to teach myself thru books/dvds, another is to attend a morning masters group and try to pick up stuff from the group practices, a third option is to work with a local TI coach. I guess a forth option would be a combination of the foregoing.
Sorry for the long post! Any help/suggestions on how to best go from here would be very much appreciated. How best would I focus my time and attention?
Thank you for your time.
Parents
Former Member
Me, again.
During my lesson, the instructor had me doing the following drills:
Right arm on kick board, left arm back and resting on buttocks, kick and practice rotating/breathing to left side. Forward arm is against head, behind ear.
Same as #1, but switched arms and rotational side.
Same as #1, but instead of leaving "rear arm" on buttocks, stroked with this arm, rotating to breath every other stroke.
Same as #3, but switched arms and rotational side.
Catch-up drill with kick board, breathing bilaterally every 3rd stroke.
Same as #5, but no kick board.
In each of these drills she had me in red zoomers - they were what was available in my size.
My next lesson is next week (they are once per week). Between lessons, she said to work on these drills.
I am uncertain as to how many of each of these drills I should do per session. Also, how much rest should I allow my self between each 25m drill? Although I am used to swimming 2000m per session 3x per week, these drills leave me far more winded than my prior sessions did. My thought is that it is counter productive at this stage (early stage of lessons) to do these drills tired, but instead I should concentrate on doing them correctly.
So my plan for this morning's swim was to do each drill for 4x25 with 0:15 rest - and do this twice. Total yardage was 1200m. Turned out that I came close, but my rest was inconsistent and ranged from 15 sec to 25 sec.
I bought a pair of blue zoomers to use. But, it seemed that when I rotated, I was having a lot of trouble being high enough to breath without water engulfing my mouth - especially as I tired. The pool had a pair of generic, larger swim fins and I switched to these toward the end of the workout and they seemed to work better. I plan on using them for the entire workour next time (rather than the zoomers).
Does it sound like I am going about this the right way? Any thoughts/insight would be appreciated.
Thanks!:)
Me, again.
During my lesson, the instructor had me doing the following drills:
Right arm on kick board, left arm back and resting on buttocks, kick and practice rotating/breathing to left side. Forward arm is against head, behind ear.
Same as #1, but switched arms and rotational side.
Same as #1, but instead of leaving "rear arm" on buttocks, stroked with this arm, rotating to breath every other stroke.
Same as #3, but switched arms and rotational side.
Catch-up drill with kick board, breathing bilaterally every 3rd stroke.
Same as #5, but no kick board.
In each of these drills she had me in red zoomers - they were what was available in my size.
My next lesson is next week (they are once per week). Between lessons, she said to work on these drills.
I am uncertain as to how many of each of these drills I should do per session. Also, how much rest should I allow my self between each 25m drill? Although I am used to swimming 2000m per session 3x per week, these drills leave me far more winded than my prior sessions did. My thought is that it is counter productive at this stage (early stage of lessons) to do these drills tired, but instead I should concentrate on doing them correctly.
So my plan for this morning's swim was to do each drill for 4x25 with 0:15 rest - and do this twice. Total yardage was 1200m. Turned out that I came close, but my rest was inconsistent and ranged from 15 sec to 25 sec.
I bought a pair of blue zoomers to use. But, it seemed that when I rotated, I was having a lot of trouble being high enough to breath without water engulfing my mouth - especially as I tired. The pool had a pair of generic, larger swim fins and I switched to these toward the end of the workout and they seemed to work better. I plan on using them for the entire workour next time (rather than the zoomers).
Does it sound like I am going about this the right way? Any thoughts/insight would be appreciated.
Thanks!:)
