I'm new to US Masters Swimming and am a fitness swimmer trying to get faster and build endurance. Anyone who's ever swam (swum?) in a meet should stop reading right now. Because my fastest 50 is about 53 seconds and it takes me about an hour to swim an 1,800. I'm 53 years old, working hard on technique (I have a friend who's a swim coach, and am using Emmett Hine's book "Fitness Swimming", plus a training snorkel at times. I can't wear fins because my feet cramp.). I do some 50s on 1:15 with the pace clock almost every time I swim now and seem to be a little faster. Learning a lot and it feels great. Will begin strength-training this week, too.
So, do you have any advice for a fitness swimmer--what helps with speed?
thanks!!!
Sari
Parents
Former Member
Sari
I started swimming in my late 40's, so can relate to where you are. There is some good advice here, though I say be wary about sprinting at this stage. . . .
. . . Also take a look at this site: http://www.swimsmooth.com/
Best of luck to you
BabsVa has a good point about sprinting. It's probably more important to be comfortable in the water first and be in pretty good shape. You know if your ready for that more than anyone else.
Swimsmooth has a lot of good stuff in it, including some suggestions on workouts. It's a little hard to navigate, so here's a link to the workouts section:
swimsmooth.com/training.html
I wouldn't worry about finding your 'CSS' as they call it, unless you are curious. Just start with the workouts in the left hand box, about halfway down the page.
The intervals they give are only the heart of the workout. Be sure to do 5 to 10 minutes of easy-swimming warmup to get your muscles going.
My speed, such as it is, only started to improve when I did structured workouts with intervals. The intervals encourage you to swim faster, then get some rest. Sometimes you swim a little faster, with a little rest/recovery. Sometimes you swim a lot faster, with a lot of rest/recovery. Eventually your time does come down.
One thing that Ande, especially, recommends is to keep track of your times, and I think that's a great idea. Improvement is gradual and erratic, so it's easy to miss improvement that you've made or to fool yourself that you have improved when you have not.
Sari
I started swimming in my late 40's, so can relate to where you are. There is some good advice here, though I say be wary about sprinting at this stage. . . .
. . . Also take a look at this site: http://www.swimsmooth.com/
Best of luck to you
BabsVa has a good point about sprinting. It's probably more important to be comfortable in the water first and be in pretty good shape. You know if your ready for that more than anyone else.
Swimsmooth has a lot of good stuff in it, including some suggestions on workouts. It's a little hard to navigate, so here's a link to the workouts section:
swimsmooth.com/training.html
I wouldn't worry about finding your 'CSS' as they call it, unless you are curious. Just start with the workouts in the left hand box, about halfway down the page.
The intervals they give are only the heart of the workout. Be sure to do 5 to 10 minutes of easy-swimming warmup to get your muscles going.
My speed, such as it is, only started to improve when I did structured workouts with intervals. The intervals encourage you to swim faster, then get some rest. Sometimes you swim a little faster, with a little rest/recovery. Sometimes you swim a lot faster, with a lot of rest/recovery. Eventually your time does come down.
One thing that Ande, especially, recommends is to keep track of your times, and I think that's a great idea. Improvement is gradual and erratic, so it's easy to miss improvement that you've made or to fool yourself that you have improved when you have not.
