Hi all. I am about 8 weeks out from a 5K Lake Swim. I am a strong pool swimmer but never done this distance in "open" water - pretty new here. I am convinced I can muscle though it if need be, but would like to make a competitive age group showing.
I am training almost exclusively in pool, so looking for advice, links, or books on workouts, distances, pace, taper (?), etc. Thanks for any advice.
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Former Member
On the preparation question... My experience is that you are asking 2 seperate questions (actually a lot more). The first is how to prepare for a 5K swim and the other is how to prepare for an open water swim. I swam in the ocean growing up and had no problem transitioning to an open water race years ago. How you will handle it depends on your background. If open water is new then you need to swim in open water as much as possible. I also strongly advise that you find a 1 mile open water swim to do before hand if you can. There is a lot to learn and much of it is best learned in the water.
The second question you raise is how to prepare for a 5K swim. Again that depends on the type of training you have been doing. If you are a distance freestyler, the transition will be easier. If you love to sprint 50s, look forward to an "uncomfortable" experience. Keep in mind that even if you regularly race a 1500 meters or 1650 yards in the pool, 5000 meters is a completely different animal.
My approach to a recent 5K swim was to do a 1 mile swim 2 weeks before (heck I even follow my own advise). I learned or relearned everything I needed for the 5K. It was the smartest race I ever swam. For physical preparation I did all freestyle. 5K to 6K workouts broken down various ways. The focus was to go into the final week being able to swim my race pace doing short rest intervals so I would get the feel for the race but not burn myself out.
I am also a big fan of staying in control the first 400-500 meters of the race. I always find myself passing people that went out too fast and blew up. I try to take a negative split approach to the swim. However, when I was in top shape and swimming faster, I was loathe to let a leading group get away. So you have to ask yourself if you think you are going to finish in the top 5, you had better not let the lead group gey away.
On the preparation question... My experience is that you are asking 2 seperate questions (actually a lot more). The first is how to prepare for a 5K swim and the other is how to prepare for an open water swim. I swam in the ocean growing up and had no problem transitioning to an open water race years ago. How you will handle it depends on your background. If open water is new then you need to swim in open water as much as possible. I also strongly advise that you find a 1 mile open water swim to do before hand if you can. There is a lot to learn and much of it is best learned in the water.
The second question you raise is how to prepare for a 5K swim. Again that depends on the type of training you have been doing. If you are a distance freestyler, the transition will be easier. If you love to sprint 50s, look forward to an "uncomfortable" experience. Keep in mind that even if you regularly race a 1500 meters or 1650 yards in the pool, 5000 meters is a completely different animal.
My approach to a recent 5K swim was to do a 1 mile swim 2 weeks before (heck I even follow my own advise). I learned or relearned everything I needed for the 5K. It was the smartest race I ever swam. For physical preparation I did all freestyle. 5K to 6K workouts broken down various ways. The focus was to go into the final week being able to swim my race pace doing short rest intervals so I would get the feel for the race but not burn myself out.
I am also a big fan of staying in control the first 400-500 meters of the race. I always find myself passing people that went out too fast and blew up. I try to take a negative split approach to the swim. However, when I was in top shape and swimming faster, I was loathe to let a leading group get away. So you have to ask yourself if you think you are going to finish in the top 5, you had better not let the lead group gey away.
