IMers, We're Jacks & Jills of all trades
Fly back *** free
We gotta have speed but we gotta last to finish fast.
It takes strategy & conditioning.
We train equal amounts of all 4 or have a fatal flaw.
We try to make our worst stroke not so bad.
It's worked well for Ryan Michael Eric, Ariana Kirsty & Stephony
What did you do in practice today?
the breastroke lane
The Middle Distance Lane
The Backstroke Lane
The Butterfly Lane
The SDK Lane
The Taper Lane
The Distance Lane
The IM Lane
The Sprint Free Lane
The Pool Deck
Elaine - my thought is that for a 400 IM you swim 100 fly - but you can't take it out at your 100 fly pace, so it will usually be at your 200 fly pace. For back you have already swum 100 fly, so you are already too tired to swim your 100 back pace, but you can probably swim your 200 back pace. So for fly and back you can train the same as you do for a 200 of each stroke. By the time you get to breaststroke you have already swum 200 yards (or meters). So you are about as tired as you are after a 200 breaststroke - so IMHO you need to train as if you were going to swim a 300 breaststroke. By the time you get to the free style you already have 300 yds in. You are probably more fatigued than if you swam 300 free since the other stroke are not as efficient. So you need to train for 500 free not just 400 free. Hope that makes sense.
The amount of rest really depends on the swimmer and your focus for the workout that day. 15-20 seconds rest between 50s maybe for the 400 IM to build endurance. Less rest if you can still hold your desired pace.
You might want to go longer rest sometimes to work on speed. I am not a coach and definitely not a fast swimmer so I don't really know what would work for you. I just go with rule of thumb that shorter rest between repeats builds endurance , longer rest lets you swim faster so helps build speed. That's a pretty broad generalization, so there are many people on the forum here that can help you more with the amount of rest. I just like the set because you practice all the turns and I don't get bored in the middle.
Elaine - my thought is that for a 400 IM you swim 100 fly - but you can't take it out at your 100 fly pace, so it will usually be at your 200 fly pace. For back you have already swum 100 fly, so you are already too tired to swim your 100 back pace, but you can probably swim your 200 back pace. So for fly and back you can train the same as you do for a 200 of each stroke. By the time you get to breaststroke you have already swum 200 yards (or meters). So you are about as tired as you are after a 200 breaststroke - so IMHO you need to train as if you were going to swim a 300 breaststroke. By the time you get to the free style you already have 300 yds in. You are probably more fatigued than if you swam 300 free since the other stroke are not as efficient. So you need to train for 500 free not just 400 free. Hope that makes sense.
The amount of rest really depends on the swimmer and your focus for the workout that day. 15-20 seconds rest between 50s maybe for the 400 IM to build endurance. Less rest if you can still hold your desired pace.
You might want to go longer rest sometimes to work on speed. I am not a coach and definitely not a fast swimmer so I don't really know what would work for you. I just go with rule of thumb that shorter rest between repeats builds endurance , longer rest lets you swim faster so helps build speed. That's a pretty broad generalization, so there are many people on the forum here that can help you more with the amount of rest. I just like the set because you practice all the turns and I don't get bored in the middle.
