The SDK Lane

NO, NOT, NEVER, NEGATIVE, NOPE swim it in practice the way you want to race it in a meet swim it the way that allows you to do the best time & live to tell That was exactly my gut reaction. Swimming fly when you stroke starts to fall apart is not helpful.

28 32 1:00 36 1:36 44 2:20 he went vertical on that last 50, it was awful, painful, & somewhat hilarious to witness in a twisted sort of way Although this is a little off subject, would there be any benefit of actually performing this in practice as a lactate production set, by going out too fast for say, a 200, and just barely making it back? Or like attempting sets of 100's at your 25 pace and dying before you finish each

28 32 1:00 36 1:36 44 2:20 That looks almost identical to my 200 fly split at the PNAs this year. I only dropped to a 38 the last 50 and ended with a 2:17.:blush:

why would I want to practice that way? Plus as you die, your mechanics will degrade horribly and you don't want to gain bad habits. I'll do some research on this next year. Note the use the word research, not training. I see no real potential benefit for someone like you. There are many ways to do lactate-tolerance sets that will give you the desired physiological adaptations without resorting to the "sprint until you die, then keep swimming" repeats. obviously. A couple interesting links to short articles: Thanks. Most of these facts are well known by now, but I am not wiling to call these sets H+/K+ tolerance sets anyway. Seriously, Lactate levels can still be used as proxi for monitoring fatigue level during supra-threshold efforts.

From now on, the SDK will follow every single turn I perform in the future. NO, NOT, NEVER, NEGATIVE, NOPE swim it in practice the way you want to race it in a meet swim it the way that allows you to do the best time & live to tell and Lactate tolerance sets -- and a subset of these, "race-pace" sets -- are critical to swimming fast. I do a lot of these, but I never ever do them as just mentioned: basically, sprint as fast as you can and try to hold on. I never race that way, why would I want to practice that way? Plus as you die, your mechanics will degrade horribly and you don't want to gain bad habits. There are many ways to do lactate-tolerance sets that will give you the desired physiological adaptations without resorting to the "sprint until you die, then keep swimming" repeats. A couple interesting links to short articles: www.drmirkin.com/.../lactic_acid.html (challenges the theory that acidification is reason that muscles "seize up" as LA concentration increases) www.drmirkin.com/.../lactic_acid_intervals.html (most swimmers don't need to be sold on the benefits of interval training, but still interesting)Thanks.

Dr Mirkin is my friend's dad. How's everyones SDKs going today. I did 2 fast 50's SDK from a push SCY went 26.2 & 26.0 Mon did 15 x 100 LCM fly K with no board no fins from a dive most were 17's, a few 18's, 2 19's & last was 1:14 did 6 SDKs off the dive & 0 off the turn except for the last one hope to take another whack at it on Monday ande A couple interesting links to short articles: www.drmirkin.com/.../lactic_acid.html (challenges the theory that acidification is reason that muscles "seize up" as LA concentration increases) www.drmirkin.com/.../lactic_acid_intervals.html (most swimmers don't need to be sold on the benefits of interval training, but still interesting)

I need to spend A LOT more time in this lane! About a year ago I decided that to be more competitive needed to learn how to do SDKs. I am trying to use it predominantly for backstroke, but also for butterfly. (So far, there is no way my SDK is faster than my freestyle, so I just get to the surface and start swimming.) To date, I can do 6 SDKs off every wall backstroke in warmup and 3 in the main workout. (In a race it is like 5 on the start and 3 off the turns.) For fly I do 3 SDKs off every wall, but I don't swim a lot of fly. A few times per week I do sets of repeat 25s doing SDK as far as I can and then ez stroke for the rest of the 25. On a good day I can do about 12 SDKs and that gets me.... I am embarrassed to say... just past 7 yards out. This seems like a miserable performance to me. The only good news is that there is NO danger of being DQ'ed for going past the 15m mark! I guess it is better than the 0 SDKs that I could do a year ago, but I am wondering how many more years it is going to take before the SDK thing starts to be an advantage for me. I have a plan to do better this season. Hopefully progress will be swifter. I'd like to hear others' experiences. From when you started to try SDK for the first time, how did it progress for you?

We had to do shooters the other night with fins. I normally NEVER use fins, but this night was kind of fun. I did my first 25 completely underwater just doing SDK. It was the coolest experience ever until I realized I wasn't watching where I was going and crashed in the bulkhead.

Since we're at the beginning of a new season I thought I'd bump all the lanes to see which one is winning

I'm not proficient at SDKs, but have incorporated them in the last year and do 2-3 off of every wall in practice. But something I have noticed- they feel much better in practice than they do in a race. If you want to use them effectively in a race, you have to practice them at race pace. Otherwise, you'll just be shakin your groove thang down there. I intend to do more 50s (in short course) where the swim is close to race pace, but the walls are at 50 free race pace. These drills will have gobs of rest, as the intent is to concentrate on technique and feel at speed. I'm sure there are other ways to improve your SDKs in a race and not just in practice, but this is something I intend to work on. :2cents: