In threads where training philosophy comes up, discussions of TRIMPS and TSS and other training models occasionally intrude. These models are not very well known, and even more poorly understood, so probably SolarEnergy, qbrain and I are just talking to each other and killing threads in those conversations. In any case, I figured I would present a brief overview of what it is that we're talking about when this terminology starts showing up.
Best case, this will introduce these models to the subset of swimmers (or coaches) who would be interested enough to use them, but didn't previously know enough to do so.
Plus, even if you're not the type to be interested in quantifying your training, it can be useful to think about workouts in this general framework.
And, at the very least, this might serve as a place to discuss some of the details without worrying about driving those other threads too far off-topic.
Steve,
How would 1.2, 1.2 and 1.6 (fly,back,***) work with the numbers you have collected?
breaststroke energy points = regular energy points * 1.6
I am just now reading over the details of Q's point system; I didn't have time to do more than skim it before. I'd be interested in tracking it for a time in my own workouts, and especially for computing it for my taper workouts as compared to my "regular" workouts. Since taper often involves less yardage but faster swimming, a system that includes quality is attractive to make sure one is resting enough (or not resting too much).
Q, can you re-post the formula and give an example or two on how to calculate the energy points for a set?
If I am understanding correctly, BR would have a higher multiplier because, essentially, it is a slow stroke that nonetheless requires a lot of energy to swim slowly. :) Fair enough.
But I don't know if I agree that back and fly are equivalent to each other. Speaking only for myself, I think that swimming back and free require roughly equivalent energy for the same time. Since free is a faster stroke, there should be a multiplier for back that is > 1, fine. But I think a 20% is too much. It wouldn't be hard to compute ratios of (say) records or TT times and get some idea of a reasonable average.
I think the multiplier for Fly needs to be higher than for backstroke. A butterfly set or repeat always seems to get my HR higher (and take more effort) than back or free, regardless of "quality level." I believe that fly, like ***, has greater fluctuations in forward velocity and would require more energy for a given repeat time.
interesting thread. i got excited because i was about to propose a multiplier for stroke... but i was beat to it :(
i've never looked at math models as a way to reflect training methods. maybe its something im missing, but where did some of the things like intensity cubed is proportional to power come from? test data? or jsut something i am not seeing?
interesting thread. i got excited because i was about to propose a multiplier for stroke... but i was beat to it :(
i've never looked at math models as a way to reflect training methods. maybe its something im missing, but where did some of the things like intensity cubed is proportional to power come from? test data? or jsut something i am not seeing?
Physics. This link covers most of the formulas that have come up.
en.wikipedia.org/.../Drag_(physics)
Chris,
Energy points is just energy without the constants and any variables that should be approximately constant for a given swimmer.
Ep = (d/t)^3*t
Ep is energy points
d is distance in meters
t is time in seconds
So velocity cubed times time.
The ratios I suggested are based on the men's worlds records in the 200 of each stroke. I was in a hurry, so I didn't see if the ratios were the same for the women's records. I will check later.
Breaststroke would have a higher multiple because the drag coefficient and the area of the body are larger than freestyle. I am not sure this makes sense for backstroke, because you would expect backstroke to have lower drag coefficient and area compared to butterfly. I was using the energy point ratio to approximate those values, because I can't think of what else would yield similar results.
As for backstroke not being as hard as butterfly. Since the formula only cares about speed, there is no additional function to account for the loss through inefficiency. Kick is the best example. Kick takes a lot of caloric energy, but your not rewarded with more energy points because kick is not an efficient means of forward propulsion. There is a lot of waste pushing water the wrong direction. Better gauges for effort exist, although they are not as simple to collect data for. My goal was to recommend something that was easy to collect data for and would reward speed over quantity. It is meant to compete with GTD not be an advanced model.
Energy in terms of its contribution of forward motion, not effort.
A lot of things don't get rewarded. Doing fly, kick sets, drills, warm up that you might want to encourage. Energy points don't replace intelligent workout design, coaching or anything but maybe GTD.
I posted some spreadsheets here with example calculations.
forums.usms.org/showpost.php
I have used qbrain's energy points for a few workouts now. Some comments:
I think it's pretty good at rewarding quality. It's nice to know you'll earn a few more points as a reward for squeezing an extra second out of that next rep.
It's definitely a good counter to the natural tendency to just count yards. I was surprised that this morning's workout earned me fewer points than Monday's despite swimming 10% more yards today. That gives me an excuse to look back over the workout and see why.
It's forcing me to pay more attention to landing times. This is both good and bad. My group tends to do stuff on prescribed rest, rather than prescribed intervals. So normally I'm paying more attention to effort level than to landing times. Especially for short-rest sets (:05 to :10) when I often don't bother to look at a pace clock to count my rest. But even though it's a bit of a hassle, I'm sure having more pace-awareness is good for me.
Mixing in stroke & kick causes problems. Throwing away the swimmer-dependent constants is a very clever idea, but everyone becomes a "different" swimmer (for these purposes) when swimming different strokes. It takes a lot more energy (power, lactic acid, etc) for me to swim 100 BR in 1:20 than to swim 100 FR in 1:20, but I earn the same number of "points" for each. Kick is also a conundrum. I can knock myself out doing 100 kick, and only earn about half as many points as a 100 swum at warmup pace. That may actually be reasonable for energy expenditure, though.
To me, there are two purposes for any point system (energy points, trimps, TSS, whatever). One is as a reward system. Energy points are a convenient way to reward quality, but they discourage "inefficient" modes like stroke & kick. The second purpose is to contribute towards training cycle planning (for injury prevention, peaking, taper, etc). I don't know enough yet to compare them to other alternatives for this purpose.
Thanks for posting that Steve.
I knew there was a problem with pretty much anything but freestyle but I didn't think it was worthwhile to make the system more complex. At least not yet.
Stroke really deserves a multiplier. Butterfly, back and *** really do require more energy to go the same speeds because of the increased drag. This is a linear factor and it could be easily added to the system without too much confusion.
Kicking on the other hand doesn't. Kicking probably experiences less drag than freestyle, it is just not very efficient at forward propulsion. So there isn't an correct way to adjust the points for the system.
This system does not reward kick sets, drills, warm up or cool down.
This doesn't make sense. If you are traveling the same distance in the same time with the same stroke, why would energy be different?
Fly is just causing you to go into more anaerobic debt the longer you swim it. With 50s you have time to catch up that with 100s you don't. So with 100s you get more pain for the same amount of energy as twice as many 50s. What a deal!
I guess the problem is that your system is partly to reward "quality" -- read: anaerobic -- efforts (velocity cubed!) without using fancy equipment. But in this case, the points don't match up well with what a HR monitor would show.
