Compare open water speed to pool speed?

Drafting in the pool is a no-brainer. It can speed you up by a solid 5 seconds per 100 behind freestyler, and even more behind a big breaststroker. The closer you are to the leader, and the bigger he is, the higher is your benefit. I would not recommend following a 200+ lb elite male without asking his permission first from "parking lot safety" standpoint :-). In the open water drafting your friend, who is willing to pull you through the race can be as helpful as in the pool. Your leader has to be absolutely committed to the cause, should keep course, and pace that is perfect for you. So, you need to find a leader who can hold pace at least 5 seconds per 100 faster than you and practice this "tandem" in the OW. Teaming up in a manner that would benefit every team member requires outstanding level of cooperation, because the exchanges are lengthy. You loose more on exchanges than you save by drafting. The draft stream is very narrow, therefore only one swimmer can benefit from following the leader, so the third swimmer would have to follow second swimmer and eventually make up 2 body lengths with 2 gaps =~ 4-5 yards. Here goes your 3-4 seconds per exchange for the third swimmer. Even more for larger teams. One weaker link on the team will kill the whole idea, so at contemporary level of the OW sport team racing is not known as an advantage to the faster individual swimmer. It is most difficult, or not even practical to draft off of your competitor for a relatively long (30 seconds or more) time. 1. Staying the course is likely to be a problem. You don't want to add zigzags of your leader to your own zigzags. Unfortunately, effects of two independent factors never subtract from each other, they always add up and this is not a joke. Look up a book in mathematical statistics, section on ANOVA for solid discussion of the principles behind this steatement. 2. Optimal race pace strategy from physical and physiological standpoint is zero positive or negative acceleration. The less you deviate from your average pace, the less energy you have to exort. If in doubt, try to swim 1000 holding 1:00 on every 50 and then compare it to holding 1:30 on the odd 50s, and 0:30 on the evens. You will cover 1000 in 20 minutes in both sets, but what a difference in terms of your energy spent. So, keeping even pace is the key to best performance. By deliberately adjusting your pace to somebody else's pace you are adding (slower / faster) pattern to your own (tipically already imperfect) pacing. Therefore you are at risk of wasting your precious "gas". Having said all that, for the short portions of the race, though, never pass up an opportunity. In open water as in the pool, the closer you are to the feet of your leader, and the wider "tube" of turbulense behind your leader is , the higher effect of the draft.

Drafting in the pool is a no-brainer. It can speed you up by a solid 5 seconds per 100 behind freestyler, and even more behind a big breaststroker. The closer you are to the leader, and the bigger he is, the higher is your benefit. I would not recommend following a 200+ lb elite male without asking his permission first from "parking lot safety" standpoint :-). In the open water drafting your friend, who is willing to pull you through the race can be as helpful as in the pool. Your leader has to be absolutely committed to the cause, should keep course, and pace that is perfect for you. So, you need to find a leader who can hold pace at least 5 seconds per 100 faster than you and practice this "tandem" in the OW. Teaming up in a manner that would benefit every team member requires outstanding level of cooperation, because the exchanges are lengthy. You loose more on exchanges than you save by drafting. The draft stream is very narrow, therefore only one swimmer can benefit from following the leader, so the third swimmer would have to follow second swimmer and eventually make up 2 body lengths with 2 gaps =~ 4-5 yards. Here goes your 3-4 seconds per exchange for the third swimmer. Even more for larger teams. One weaker link on the team will kill the whole idea, so at contemporary level of the OW sport team racing is not known as an advantage to the faster individual swimmer. It is most difficult, or not even practical to draft off of your competitor for a relatively long (30 seconds or more) time. 1. Staying the course is likely to be a problem. You don't want to add zigzags of your leader to your own zigzags. Unfortunately, effects of two independent factors never subtract from each other, they always add up and this is not a joke. Look up a book in mathematical statistics, section on ANOVA for solid discussion of the principles behind this steatement. 2. Optimal race pace strategy from physical and physiological standpoint is zero positive or negative acceleration. The less you deviate from your average pace, the less energy you have to exort. If in doubt, try to swim 1000 holding 1:00 on every 50 and then compare it to holding 1:30 on the odd 50s, and 0:30 on the evens. You will cover 1000 in 20 minutes in both sets, but what a difference in terms of your energy spent. So, keeping even pace is the key to best performance. By deliberately adjusting your pace to somebody else's pace you are adding (slower / faster) pattern to your own (tipically already imperfect) pacing. Therefore you are at risk of wasting your precious "gas". Having said all that, for the short portions of the race, though, never pass up an opportunity. In open water as in the pool, the closer you are to the feet of your leader, and the wider "tube" of turbulense behind your leader is , the higher effect of the draft.