Training article - For everyone!

... For example, at the most important public university on the West Coast (;)) in the mid 1980s, we had a state-of-the-art strength training program (that included weightlifting, a "speed circuit of isokinetic apparatuses, the notorious "wheels", and an in-water circuit), but we did no physiological assessments other than heart rate, body fat, diet, etc. No V02 max, no lactate measurement, nada. Interesting, looking back. Was it time involved? Cost? Cost/benefit?At a more important (;)) university in heart of Texas in the late mid to late 1980s, we also had little to no assessments other than times/speed. I can remember peeing in a cup for drug testing, but nothing more. It seemed to work pretty well then, but I wonder if anyone in that time period in swimming was doing more advanced physiological testing? Don't the elites these days do lactate testing and more?

But nothing about these systems suggests that one is the "base", unless you happen to think that sprinting isn't real swimming because it's not painful enough or time-consuming enough. Hi Jazz I just realized that I answered this post previously without first carefully reading it (sorry). If you don't mind me quoting myself in another thread which pertains specifically to Base building... The composition of your Base can include any sort of work (from low level endurance to anaerobic capacity sets). That is the first domain of discussion that Cyclists could sort out rapidly few years back. In other words, the Base is not exclusively made of low level endurance swimming. That said though, what recent research shown, and it's only logical, is that if you want to build a big base, you're not going to achieve this by throwing mostly anaerobic component to it. That's why even though we recognize that the Base can include all sort of stuff, it will always be mostly made of aerobic component. Let us remind ourselves that it would be very hard to go over 20min of anaerobic work day in day out. (for an elite sprinter, that would be around 20x100 at race pace). You do this Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and some day something bad will come out of this obsession for race pace training. So in case this yields the question as to what is the Base exactly? Simply speaking, it is your ability to perform work. The more work you can perform, the more work you'll be able to perform, regardless of the composition of this work. Like I explained in a few earlier posts, Cyclists (who I believe have an edge, at least in their ability to precisely quantify the magnitude of your Base) now call this: Chronic (read weekly) Training Load.

So in case this yields the question as to what is the Base exactly? Simply speaking, it is your ability to perform work. The more work you can perform, the more work you'll be able to perform, regardless of the composition of this work. Like I explained in a few earlier posts, Cyclists (who I believe have an edge, at least in their ability to precisely quantify the magnitude of your Base) now call this: Chronic (read weekly) Training Load. I don't think I've seen it described this way before, at least in a swimming context. Interesting idea.

I don't think I've seen it described this way before, at least in a swimming context. Interesting idea. Basically, it is expressed in term of a score per day. This score is obtained by somehow (allow me to skip the nitty-gritty details here) multiplying duration * intensity. In cycling, a score of 100 is equivalent to performing 60min flat out over the duration. A roadie will want to get the base to grow up to 100tss/d. In other words, they grow their base to an extent where they're able to perform a 60min TT per day. A trackie, say a kilo specialist (an event that lasts 1min05 roughly) will rather want to grow his base up to 60tss/d. They deposit to their Base for a long period of time, then when comes the time to train more specifically for their event, they withdraw from it. Cyclists and coaches all have their own little graphs where they can track: - The magnitude of their base (CTL) - The magnitude of the fatigue generated along the base building process (ATL) - The fitness peaks (TLB) The question you frequently see nowadays is: How big should my base be, given that I want to later in the season specialize for this or that event duration. This is how these graphs look like (ref: my PMC for 2008). The blue line (that constantly grows) is my Base. The pink one is the fatigue curve. The yellow one is (Base - Fatigue = Fitness) pic20.picturetrail.com/.../372583549.jpg

Solar - I liked your response and it made a ton of sense. I found that building a strong aerobic base was the key to a good season. After that we did 3X week of anarobic and/or V02Max (get some of that, Ion) work for a few weeks. This approach is very safe and conventional. You grew your work capacity up to a certain extent, then lost a bit of it in favor of more quality work. Was validated way back then by Bompa, and it still applies today in my humble opinion.

This definitely rings true, though I never thought of it in terms of time before. In my experience, more than 10 minutes of anaerobic swimming per day is not sustainable for more than a week or two. Et voila. This now yields a question for Fortress: Can you really manage to perform more than the half of every of your workout targeting anaerobic capacity? A typical workout is made of - A warm up (mostly aerobic) - Technical work (very often mostly aerobic) - Race pace set: say.... 16x100, 1 slow 1 ALL OUT (that's 50/50) - Cool down (mostly aerobic) My point really is that even the biggest proponents of race pace training will have a lot of difficulty bringing their Anaerobic/Aerobic ratio to 50/50 without dying real soon after the start of the season. And those (like me) who fear getting into the hurt box (working on 100m repeats) and stick to reps of 25 and 50 won't develop their anaerobic capacity to its full extent. And that is not to mention this 35% of aerobic capacity contribution to the 100m, which involves developing MaxO2Peak. In other words, the 400/200/100 are all interrelated. Anyway... my :2cents:

But is this what you recommend for 50s & 100s? Fortress, I am pretty sure that it is actually what you do. What's your avg weekly volume (over a season)? I am sure that the answer to this question will be much higher than the actual work done in the anaerobic capacity spectrum. Believe it or not, my acutal weekly volume, that I can sustain without getting injured or overtrained is around 9-10k. So in Cycling world's definitions, I maintain a Base of 10/7 = 1.42 kilo per day. It has been good enough to allow me to earn 3 podiums at 50/100/200 butterfly at our last Provincial Championship (30.4, 1:14.5, 3:17 - outch). Now I tackle on the 1500, in hope of a podium at the nationals (either in 1500 or 200 fly). That base is way too low. I intend to grow it up to 15k per week, or 2.14 kilo per day. In prep for my main event, I will let it drop down to the minimal level required to peak. This is how performance modeling is achieve nowadays in the cycling community. Then if I fail, I will have to revise this approach for season 2012.

No, it would never even occur to me to do that. My point is I don't spend much time intentionally "base building" (which is not to say I don't have a base) and I don't do much hard aerobic work on short rest intervals. I do plenty of technique work and recovery swimming in addition to anaerobic efforts. Sounds cool !! Just bare in mind, in case that your coach might schedule some hard aerobic work on tight intervals that these will also greatly help your performances over 100. Anaerobic capacity is highly dependent on Aerobic capacity. Like Q mentioned, passed a certain point, these two may conflict with each other but very few members here will ever reach this point in my opinion. How can this be read and understood? Simple. Your 200free will help your 100free. Like you may guess, the 200free does so by allowing you to finish your 100 stronger. Training isn't that complicated after all. It all depends on the angle from which we look at it.

journals.lww.com/.../Aerobic_High_Intensity_Intervals_Improve_V_spacing.12.aspx This link is to a study that relates to the current discussion. Four groups of randomly selected moderately trained subjects in their 20’s performed four distinct running exercise protocols that ranged from long slow distance (70% max HR for approx 45 minutes); lactate threshold (85% max HR for 24-25 minutes); 15 seconds @ 95% alternating with 15 seconds of recovery (47 repetitons; and 4 minutes @ 95% HR alternating with 3 minutes of recovery (4 repetions). All four protocols were designed to result in similar total oxygen consumption and were performed 3 X/ week for 8 weeks. Bottom line, the high intensity groups increased aerobic capacity significantly more than the less intense groups (5.5% for the 15/15 group and 7.2% for the 4 x 4 minute group. What I found to be of particular interest was the huge increase in stroke volume (amount of blood pumped per heart beat) in the high intensity groups compared to the moderate aerobic groups. My point in referencing this article is about how to improve your aerobic capacity. I’m not addressing anaerobic capacity at all. So, if you’re more of the endurance type athlete, this is something to consider when working on your “aerobic base.” BTW, I do believe that at least one day a week you should do an aerobic recovery day never getting your heart rate higher than 40 beats less than your max. Current research supports that this will enable higher levels of anaerobic work capacity in training. I also believe that the physiological research in track, cross country skiing and cycling is more advanced than research in swimming. This is very interesting, and not totally counter-intuitive. And I totally agree that the other sports are more advanced in their physiological research. This may have to do with the fact that, until "relatively" recently, elite swimmers trained only with clubs and universities, which may not have been interested in making their under-age swimmers available for such research. Contrast that with Olympic and professional sports like track and cycling, which have had well-developed training centers and testing protocols for decades. In that regard, swimming is way behind. For example, at the most important public university on the West Coast (;)) in the mid 1980s, we had a state-of-the-art strength training program (that included weightlifting, a "speed circuit of isokinetic apparatuses, the notorious "wheels", and an in-water circuit), but we did no physiological assessments other than heart rate, body fat, diet, etc. No V02 max, no lactate measurement, nada. Interesting, looking back. Was it time involved? Cost? Cost/benefit?

Or read the blogs! I do read blogs, including Aquageek's and Q's. But I do learn from other sources though, including from my bunch of friends on Facebook (Coggan et al.), my bunch of books, the athletes which I coach etc...