OK, here's a dumb newbie question. Does everyone always swim freestyle in open water events?
I recently did my first one mile open water ocean swim, finished in 39:01 (don't laugh), but if I'm not mistaken, that's good enough to qualify for the Chesapeake Bay Swim next year, which is my goal. My problem is that freestyle is my absolute worst stroke (never learned fly, never want to). I regularly do two miles in the pool, easily, feel like I could keep going and going...but do mostly breastroke. I can barely do a quarter mile on freestyle.
As you probably guessed, I'm a total newbie, don't belong to any groups, never swam on a team or anything like that, just thought I can do twice the distance in the pool, so why not try it? The water was sort of choppy, so when I needed more power I did some backstroke, which is much easier for me than freestyle, and at least I could navigate better with that; I could not sight with freestyle, and probably wouldn't even have finished if I hadn't gone with breastroke (which I'm a natural at).
So my question is, should I force myself to do freestyle, or train for open water with breastroke? On a quarter mile, my freestyle isn't even faster than my breastroke (guess I'm just weird). Of course, if I ever do the Bay Swim, my goal is not to place, that's never gonna happen, just to finish - and if I finish dead last I'll be delighted, as long as I get there...
Thanks,
Sandra
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Former Member
Thanks, Rob.
It's encouraging to know that I don't have to swim front crawl (I'd thought that "freestyle" and "front crawl" were synonymous) and that a few other people do breastroke. At my first and so far only race (the one mile Jack King swim in Virginia Beach) I was the only one.
Do you think that if I start training now, I might be ready for the Bay Swim next year? If I add 20% to my one mile pace (I'd want to maintain my one mile pace, but since I haven't done a 4.4 mile swim yet, don't know how much slower I'd be at that distance) that would give me a 47 minute mile pace. Sure that's slow, but I checked out this year's results and there were some finishers at that pace or a little slower, which makes me wonder if it might be possible to finish that race.
Have to admit I hadn't thought about the breastroke kick, but I did start at the back of the pack, because I guessed that I'd come in last, which I did (but first in my age group because no one else showed up or finished, so I got a medal for finishing dead last, which was totally cool).
Sandra
Thanks, Rob.
It's encouraging to know that I don't have to swim front crawl (I'd thought that "freestyle" and "front crawl" were synonymous) and that a few other people do breastroke. At my first and so far only race (the one mile Jack King swim in Virginia Beach) I was the only one.
Do you think that if I start training now, I might be ready for the Bay Swim next year? If I add 20% to my one mile pace (I'd want to maintain my one mile pace, but since I haven't done a 4.4 mile swim yet, don't know how much slower I'd be at that distance) that would give me a 47 minute mile pace. Sure that's slow, but I checked out this year's results and there were some finishers at that pace or a little slower, which makes me wonder if it might be possible to finish that race.
Have to admit I hadn't thought about the breastroke kick, but I did start at the back of the pack, because I guessed that I'd come in last, which I did (but first in my age group because no one else showed up or finished, so I got a medal for finishing dead last, which was totally cool).
Sandra
