Maybe this should go in OW, but I'm curious to know how times compare pool to open water, if anyone can help.
I realise that weather conditions play a part, but lets assume that the lake is nice and flat and around 76F and I'm not wearing a wetsuit.
If I managed 23.50 for 1500SCM what can I realistically expect as a time for 2 laps of a 750m lake course?
Former Member
I do a cable swim every year and my OW mile is about 4 minutes slower than my 1650. The water is calm and I stay straight because of the cable. In a 1500M, there are half the number of turns so I would guess your OW time to be close to 2 minutes slower depending on whether your turns are an asset or liability.
Used to swim 3 miles in 1 hour 3 minutes in a 50yd pool. Open water 3 mile swim at the CNE half mile course inside the breakwall, 1 hr 6 minutes, + a few seconds. 1760 yards is one mile not 1650 yds.
By the way when I swam 3 miles in a pool I always did open turns, flip turns were too tiring.
Better at sighting or better at swimming straight. I think the latter is more important especially on courses where current is not a factor.
Yea, agree. I test myself on this at times. I swim my usual right-only with my eyes closed and I still manage to swim straight. In my case, and in the particular cases of the two OW swims I've done so far (where you swam around the 'circle' counter-clockwise), I see no one on the right while I'm swimming. I went pretty far after the first turn in Copenhagen, a good long stretch of about 400m before looking to the left and realizing I was too far over to the right. However, I never got too close to the right wall, so I think I was swimming straight...just not paying attention to how far over I was. I really need to work on bilat breathing. I've done that in all my pool sessions since Copenhagen.
