I'm not a new masters swimmer nor am I new to meets, but am new to the 400 IM. Truthfully, I'm a little concerned about my ability to make it through the event legally (well, I'm really mainly afraid of the 4th 25). I'm scheduled to swim the 400 IM at a meet this weekend (Saturday). There are twenty people entered, it's a 10 lane pool, and as luck would have it I'm seeded 11th. If only one person above me scratches, I'll be in a heat where the fastest person is seeded 1:40 faster than I am, and the slowest person (besides me) is still seeded 40 seconds faster than I am. My seed time is MUCH closer to the people seeded right behind me, and I think I seeded myself as accurately as I could.
So... I am extremely anxious about swimming in this heat, as I was already anxious about swimming the 400 IM. Do I scratch to save myself the humiliation and to save some energy for Sunday's events? Or do I get lapped at least twice by the leaders, once by the next slowest person, and tick everyone off for holding up the meet? I'm already swimming the 1000 earlier in the session, and the 400 IM will be my 4th event of the day. I really have mixed feelings about this.
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Former Member
Kristen
I
I won't be there tomorrow but I'll see you Sunday and you can tell me all about it then!
Heidi
Heidi, enjoy your day off from racing and I will see you on Sunday! How was Boston last week?
The last time I swam a SCY 200 fly I went out too fast and the way I got through it was every time I pushed off I thought"you only have to swim a 25 fly and then you can hang on the wall and rest."I didn't,but knowing I could was a great comfort.Remember that in your 400 IM and go for it.
I love that idea. I will definitely use it -- thank you!!
S C is better to try a 400 I M cuz of the friendly walls! :applaud::banana:
Absolutely!
I was in the same situation as you the first time I ever swam a 400 IM--fastest heat, way slowest swimmer. I knew I should just be racing the clock, like everyone is telling you, but I was self-conscious about finishing last, plus I never really like seeing everyone going by me in a race. One thing that helped is that I decided that I wanted to swim just one split--breaststroke in my case, but you could pick anything late in the race--faster than someone else in my heat. That helped me swim slow enough in the fly that the rest of the race was manageable, and even fun. So yeah, I got lapped by most of the field, but I finished, and swam a smart race instead of trying to race faster folks from the get-go. And I was really proud when I looked at the splits and saw that I had indeed out-breaststroked the guy next to me who had nearly lapped me on the fly.
Just a thought--you seem to have lots of good advice on swimming the race, and I'm sure you'll have a blast at the meet, and swim an incredible IM!
That's great advice too, Janet! Thanks, and I will do that as well -- in my case it will be freestyle. I actually have a fairly strong freestyle split in my 200 IM, and doing that will probably help my kick at the end of the 400. And I'll bet that approach actually helps all of the splits to be faster than they would be by taking the pressure off.
Edit: Janet, I recognized your name -- I think you are in my age group, and beat me at several events at the Auburn meet. :-) Nice swimming!
Kristen
I
I won't be there tomorrow but I'll see you Sunday and you can tell me all about it then!
Heidi
Heidi, enjoy your day off from racing and I will see you on Sunday! How was Boston last week?
The last time I swam a SCY 200 fly I went out too fast and the way I got through it was every time I pushed off I thought"you only have to swim a 25 fly and then you can hang on the wall and rest."I didn't,but knowing I could was a great comfort.Remember that in your 400 IM and go for it.
I love that idea. I will definitely use it -- thank you!!
S C is better to try a 400 I M cuz of the friendly walls! :applaud::banana:
Absolutely!
I was in the same situation as you the first time I ever swam a 400 IM--fastest heat, way slowest swimmer. I knew I should just be racing the clock, like everyone is telling you, but I was self-conscious about finishing last, plus I never really like seeing everyone going by me in a race. One thing that helped is that I decided that I wanted to swim just one split--breaststroke in my case, but you could pick anything late in the race--faster than someone else in my heat. That helped me swim slow enough in the fly that the rest of the race was manageable, and even fun. So yeah, I got lapped by most of the field, but I finished, and swam a smart race instead of trying to race faster folks from the get-go. And I was really proud when I looked at the splits and saw that I had indeed out-breaststroked the guy next to me who had nearly lapped me on the fly.
Just a thought--you seem to have lots of good advice on swimming the race, and I'm sure you'll have a blast at the meet, and swim an incredible IM!
That's great advice too, Janet! Thanks, and I will do that as well -- in my case it will be freestyle. I actually have a fairly strong freestyle split in my 200 IM, and doing that will probably help my kick at the end of the 400. And I'll bet that approach actually helps all of the splits to be faster than they would be by taking the pressure off.
Edit: Janet, I recognized your name -- I think you are in my age group, and beat me at several events at the Auburn meet. :-) Nice swimming!
