Hi everyone... I'm new to the forums, so I hope I'm not bringing up a topic that's been covered already.
I just got in to the Great Chesapeake Bay Swim, and now I need to start training. I've been out of the pool completely for about 6 months due to illness and life getting in the way, and I'm looking for tips on how to get back into it without burning myself out or wearing myself out or getting bored, but still getting in the yards I need to in order to do well (i.e., finish without feeling like a drowned rat).
I'm training by myself, which makes it harder, especially with the bored part. All suggestions welcome, and I hope I'll see some of you in June.
The Workouts section posts daily workouts by three different coaches. One, Chris Layton, always includes a distance workout per week:
forums.usms.org/forumdisplay.php
There are threads on preparing for last year's Great Chesapeake Bay Swim, and also a number of threads from "returnees" right after the last Olympics. Perhaps these will tide you over until you get a more specific response.
Also, see the thread "Fun, and Fast" for some good ideas and challenging workouts that help distance swimmers as well as sprinters. CreamPuff's blog has some interesting, tough workouts, as do others.
Regards, VB
I was in the same boat last year, got into the race and hadn't swum in probably a year. I was fat and out of shape and just slowly started increasing my yardage per workout by about 200 yards/week until I was around 1500. Then, I started using the book Workouts in a Binder: Swim Workouts for Triathletes
You can pick and choose workouts to get you in shape (focusing on the longer distance ones). I usually incorporated some 200 or 400 IMs to break things up. Then, about 2 months before the event I started doing about 12,000-15,000 yards/week. I made sure before the event I had a 2.5 open water swim and a 6 mile pool swim under my belt. Estimate how long it will take you to do the swim, and make sure you've swum that amount of time plus some in a pool so you know your body can swim for that long.
It worked out for me - conditions were favorable but finished in 2 hours, 30 minutes.
Everyone has a different regimen - just make sure you're swimming a lot of yardage and you'll be fine.
Cool! I didn't know there was such a thing as workouts in a binder.
I think something like that will help while I try to build up yardage. Since I train by myself, boredom becomes a huge factor. I'm not good at creating my own workouts, and lots of times I'll just do the same thing over and over. Bleah. So I'm really excited to see that and the workout blogs that VB pointed me to.
