Fortress' impressive three world record performance over the weekend made me think of this topic. Obviously the things she's doing are working well for the events she likes to swim. She concentrates on SDKs, fast swimming with lots of rest and drylands to aid in explosiveness. Long aerobic sets just aren't a part of her training regime, from what I've seen.
Almost every organized training group I've swum with, on the other hand, focuses on long aerobic sets, short rest, not a whole lot of fast stuff, etc. Basically the polar opposite of how Fortress trains. In my opinion this probably works pretty well for those who swim longer events, but really does very little for sprinters. The sprint events are almost always the most popular events at meets, so why do people choose to train aerobically? I think there are a number of factors at play. There's the much maligned triathletes. There's those who don't compete and "just want to get their yardage in." There's a historical precedent of lots of yardage being the way to go.
So what do you all think? How does you or your team train? I know lots of regular bloggers here DO train differently than my perception of the norm. Examples include Ande, Chris S. and Speedo. Are too many masters teams stuck in a training regime that is not at all what many of their swimmers need to get faster?
...At the same time, I have have known quite a few excellent distance swimmers who do not have a fast 50, or even a very fast 200 (Jeff Erwin is a masters swimmer around my age who fits this bill). Many of the best ones never lifted seriously either and aren't that strong; they just never, ever seem to get tired....The best distance swimmers I know do not "reduce their rate of speed reduction" at all, in fact they seem to get faster and stronger as the race progresses.Chris, very good points. And, Paul, while I agree with general sentiment that d-folks need to work more on speed than they typically might they need to do, I'll offer a counter-point (n=1) from my own experience.
I can sprint as fast now in the 50 as I did back in my younger days (e.g., my 22.1 in 2008 was faster than I ever went in my teens or 20s)
I was almost as fast in my 100 (e.g., 48.1 vs. 47-mid in my late teens/20s)
By the time you get to my 200, though, my best time was 3 seconds slower now than then ... 500 was close to 20 seconds slower ... 1000 was 40 seconds and mile was 76 seconds slower.
As a Masters swimmer, if I really want to get my 500/1000/1650 anywhere near the times I did in the past, I think the answer is going to be two-fold: more volume, more high intensity / short rest aerobic style sets. The energy systems, stroke rate, stroke length, kick are completely different for me in a 50/100 vs. a 500-1650. I happen to be doing probably close to 100% more sprint style work over the last few years than I ever did back in my prime training days, but I am under no illusion that that kind of training is helping my 500 to 1650.
Put it this way: to get back to my best ever 500 time, I need to be able to hold a 53 pace per 100. I did a set of 20 x 50 recently on 2:00, with most of the freestyles being 24+/25- and a few 26s, all well under what would needed to be a 53 500 pace ... but I don't think that helped my 500 at all ... of course, if I do end up swimming the 500 on Sunday at Paul's pool and do something miraculous, I will stand corrected ;)
...At the same time, I have have known quite a few excellent distance swimmers who do not have a fast 50, or even a very fast 200 (Jeff Erwin is a masters swimmer around my age who fits this bill). Many of the best ones never lifted seriously either and aren't that strong; they just never, ever seem to get tired....The best distance swimmers I know do not "reduce their rate of speed reduction" at all, in fact they seem to get faster and stronger as the race progresses.Chris, very good points. And, Paul, while I agree with general sentiment that d-folks need to work more on speed than they typically might they need to do, I'll offer a counter-point (n=1) from my own experience.
I can sprint as fast now in the 50 as I did back in my younger days (e.g., my 22.1 in 2008 was faster than I ever went in my teens or 20s)
I was almost as fast in my 100 (e.g., 48.1 vs. 47-mid in my late teens/20s)
By the time you get to my 200, though, my best time was 3 seconds slower now than then ... 500 was close to 20 seconds slower ... 1000 was 40 seconds and mile was 76 seconds slower.
As a Masters swimmer, if I really want to get my 500/1000/1650 anywhere near the times I did in the past, I think the answer is going to be two-fold: more volume, more high intensity / short rest aerobic style sets. The energy systems, stroke rate, stroke length, kick are completely different for me in a 50/100 vs. a 500-1650. I happen to be doing probably close to 100% more sprint style work over the last few years than I ever did back in my prime training days, but I am under no illusion that that kind of training is helping my 500 to 1650.
Put it this way: to get back to my best ever 500 time, I need to be able to hold a 53 pace per 100. I did a set of 20 x 50 recently on 2:00, with most of the freestyles being 24+/25- and a few 26s, all well under what would needed to be a 53 500 pace ... but I don't think that helped my 500 at all ... of course, if I do end up swimming the 500 on Sunday at Paul's pool and do something miraculous, I will stand corrected ;)
