Dryland Training For Swimmers

I have been following this thread and here is my 2 cents: I am a 59 year old fitness swimmer who also has active and sometimes demanding work and family commitments. I swim because I enjoy swimming. I used to swim less and lift weights but as I got older I was injuring myself too many times in the gym. Of course, this could have been the result of my somewhat masochistic approach to lifting. I also never actually felt that there was direct transferability between the gym and the pool. In fact, I would be very interested in hearing other opinions on this. Has anyone really seen a direct ratio between progress in lifting (weight, reps, sets or any other benchmark) and improved swimming times? Be that as it may, I have discovered that as I get older, stretching after swimming is my main dry land activity. I try to do a complete stretching routine (about 10-15 minutes) after swimming and sometimes stretch while watching TV. I feel that as one gets older, one naturally loses muscular suppleness and ROM. It is essential to prevent this from happening.

Here are some swim-specific exercises (link below). Please skip the first 2:45 minutes (talking points) Anyway, I've developed a different routine using these exercises and I use a different set for my 10 and unders, middle school and high school swimmers. I found that I needed to get in the weight room for leg exercises because I felt the cords didn't work them enough. www.youtube.com/watch

My first two years back, I could not put one hand on top of the other in streamline position. My shoulders (and entire torso) were too tight from weightlifting. What helped best was simply hanging from a bar at intervals (ie 3x 20 sec, resting about a minute in between). How often did you do this bar-hanging set? How long did it take before you got noticeable improvement in flexibility? Are you still doing shoulder stretching and if not, do you lose flexibility quickly after you stop? I've really gotta improve my shoulder flexibility.

How often did you do this bar-hanging set? How long did it take before you got noticeable improvement in flexibility? Are you still doing shoulder stretching and if not, do you lose flexibility quickly after you stop? I've really gotta improve my shoulder flexibility. I would do that whenever I was in the gym -- 2-3 times a week, generally. It was about a year of this (plus a lot of swimming and post-workout stretching) before I got to really feel like my upper half was loose. I can now streamline easily, and I don't regularly hang. I don't even feel the stretch from hanging now. My flexibility has not reverted to my former bodybuilder-like knots, through a couple of cycles of in-shape/out-of-shape for swimming. I now only do, occasionally, raises and rotations for shoulders.

> I now only do, occasionally, raises and rotations for shoulders. Raises and rotations? Can you describe? I do something where I extend my arms out in front or to the side and rotate in both directions (small circles). I never knew what they were called, but that sounds more or less like it could be what you do.

> I now only do, occasionally, raises and rotations for shoulders. Raises and rotations? Can you describe? I do something where I extend my arms out in front or to the side and rotate in both directions (small circles). I never knew what they were called, but that sounds more or less like it could be what you do. Raises: I do, as a group with light dumbells: one-arm forward raises, where you lift from arm at sides to 90 degrees forward, alternating arms; lateral raises, arms at sides raised to 90 degrees sideways; and reverse flyes, which are done bent-over, arms hanging toward the floor and lifted 90 degrees out to the sides. Rotations: Internal and external rotations (with bands). Arm is bent 90 degrees at elbow with upper arm against side of body. lower arm moves from pointing forward (like gunfighter) horizontally across body (internal) or from across body to gunfighter (external).